


True Faith

by Alexia_Imriel_Courcel



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alpha/Omega, Animal Abuse, Animal Ears, Armitage Hux Has Issues, Armitage Hux is a Jerk, Cages, Captivity, Chains, Collars, Deception, Dehumanization, Dominant Armitage Hux, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, First order backstabbing, Forced Bonding, Human Pet, Hux is Not Nice, Implied Relationships, Kissing, Kitsune, Knotting, Kylo Ren Being a Little Shit, Loss of Virginity, Master/Slave, Mention Of Forced Pregnancy, Mentioned death of Millicent, Other, Physical Abuse, Protection, Protective Hux, Psychological Torture, Rough Sex, Sex, Shape Shifters, Supreme Leader Ren, Tails, Vets, forgiveness possibly, humans with tails, implied forced breeding, kylo ren will be a dick in this, medics, prisoner, probably
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-23
Updated: 2018-12-09
Packaged: 2019-03-08 16:58:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 15
Words: 49,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13462554
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Alexia_Imriel_Courcel/pseuds/Alexia_Imriel_Courcel
Summary: I used to think that the day would never comeI'd see delight in the shade of the morning sunMy morning sun is the drug that brings me nearTo the childhood I lost, replaced by fearWhilst looking for Skywalker, Kylo Ren brings something back to the Finalizer.  Something which will both haunt and taunt the General. Prompting something he tried to both deny and hide from himself.  The question is truly is though, what will it mean to you and how will a wild animal adapt to captivity.I want you to imagine for a moment; that you perhaps are not entirely human, whilst remembering that General Hux is an asshole with issues and Kylo Ren is an even bigger asshole.An experiment.  Written as a mix of Hux's POV and reader's, this will be interesting for me to write.  Please note, this one will be a little darker than some stuff.  Again I choose not to pre-warn of anything that I feel spoils the plot.  But for those who have read my other darker stuff please note that nothing I write here will be any worse than in there. In fact if anything, I am hoping it will be a little lighter. Again I can be contacted outside of AO3, so please.  However it will be different too.





	1. Chapter 1

Aboard the flight deck of his newly acquired Resurgent-class Battlecruiser; General Hux sat in his office in the command centre; surveying the planet below him through a completely transparasteel wall.  There was no real sense of time; not in space.  But there was a synthetic night and day; and it was late.  Making him yawn to himself, as he watched the last of the Troop transports leave the atmosphere of Devaron.  Indulging himself in another large tot of whisky.  One of the few vices he allowed himself; whilst supposedly on active duty. 

Only a minute or two to go; and then that transport ship would also make dock in his ship’s hangar. All that would be left then would be for him to give the command for the ship to make the jump to hyper-space.

General Hux knew that he had already indulged one glass more than he normally should.  Not that it would make much difference; he was used now to pretending to be something he was not.  The ships navigational computer had already plotted its course hours ago.  Everything readied, whilst he was awaiting the return of that infernal idiot; Kylo Ren. 

The man; and he used that term loosely; had been on his ship only a matter of months.  But already he had caused more destruction, and generalised mayhem than Hux had known; in that time than his entire life in the military had shown him.  If it weren’t for the Supreme Leader’s order that he assist young Kylo Ren find some missing Jedi Master he would have left him. 

Right now, he was on Devaron, searching for a fabled map.  A map that if stories were true, lead to the legendry Luke Skywalker; the fabled last Jedi and the son of Darth Vader.  If it could be believed Skywalker had fled the annihilation of his new Jedi order and fled to the secret location of the first Jedi temple.  Oh, he believed in Skywalker alright.  Not only was the cause of the obliteration of the new temple, and the massacre of the Padawans currently making dock, aboard his ship.  But he also he had his father’s assurance and the old Imperial data banks to prove that the Jedi had been real.  The Skywalkers too; that the raw power they had welded had been true. 

But to believe that some mystical resting place of a temple, held the ability to destroy the whole order he strove for; was too much to ask anyone to believe.  Not only that, but it was lost to another time; another generation, and probably obliterated to nothing by now.  No, he General Hux put his faith in hard facts and results.  Of the Jedi there were no facts left to find; they were gone and better that they left Skywalker where he was; forgotten.  Better in his opinion to avoid chasing revenge; and to let old stories die.

A series of rhythmic clicks drew his attention back to the control panel sat on his work desk.  The light blinking on and off in the metal box of the rooms coms device.  Indicating that outside the door; the lead Captain of his stormtrooper programme stood waiting for admittance. 

He buzzed her in, watching as she marched forwards.  Her gait smooth and even.  The result not of years of practice; but of the inert skills of the the perfect soldier.  She gave a nod in greeting, before altering her stance to stand un bidden at ease before his desk.  Her stance though one of bored indifference and not at all like the unruly Knight.  Kylo Ren often adopted that stance, but hers was simply one of relaxation; not of a self-perceived superiority to the leader of this spaceship.  Captain Phasma had been with General Hux too many years; spent too many hours conspiring with General Hux; to dwell too hard on formalities in private.  Not only that, but that she had felt the need to be here to report on her findings so quickly; showed far more respect than any quick salute would have.      

“Sir, you wished to be informed immediately upon my return; should myself or Lord Ren find anything unusual.”

She kept her helmet on, the voice modulator expelling her words in a monotone of indifference.  But she would not be here though unless the findings were of interest to her also.  Already the General could pick up little hints that she was intrigued over something; something she found puzzling; but of interest to the order too.  Turning his head up to her, General Hux’s grey-blue gaze landed in open; but unspoken direct question on the chrome Stormtrooper’s mask. 

Captain Phasma unlike Kylo Ren was stable and reliable.  She showed intelligence; and above all not driven by an incessant need to find a map leading to some legendary and probably highly fictitious location. 

“I would describe it Sir, but in this case, I think the specimen is best seen.”

If Captain Phasma was suggesting that he should see something, he trusted that it was highly doubtful that she would be wasting his time.  She was a practical woman.  Driven by the same need to prove her efficiency as her General.  Her interest, unlike the fabled map this would be worth his time. 

Yet it would not do to let her believe herself his equal for all he trusted her judgement as an equal.  Taking both a breath, and the final sip of whiskey; he assessed the Captains countenance for clues as to any urgency; before he nodded.  Giving instructions to lead on and allowing his mind to wonder into alcohol numbed auto pilot, as he followed her to the medibay.  Their military strides matching with ease.  Feet clicking in time as they strode one after the other, along the corridors and walkways.  Each personnel moving stiffly and correctly out of their paths.  Every underling behaving in an obedient and well-practiced manner.  This worth more than their salute to him, their actions displaying that of the well-polished machine he had created; but she had tweaked.  Each man as he should be completely accepting in their natural subservience to their General.  Hux exactly where he should be, thanks to her mentoring. 

Their feet soon found the short corridor to the private medical wards.  General Hux following the Captain of the Stormtroopers to the dimly lit examination room; pleased to see her stand to one side.  Ready to be of assistance if requested; but at attention to the rest of the room. 

The medical crew inside moved aside instantly.  Each sparing him as single salute, before giving way to allow him access to the medical cot.  The lead physician quickly apologising that he had not yet been able to assess the creature he had been brought. 

“We assume it is female Sir, given the physical similarities to a human female.  But of what she is we are not sure, an experiment perhaps.”

“No doctor she is not an experiment.  I myself saw her change shape.”

The modulated; but definitely male voice appearing the other side of him, set his teeth on edge.  A vicious part of him as Kylo Ren stalked forwards; not for the first time wishing the Knight hadn’t made it back to the ship.  He was wasting his time; almost Hux called him out on that then thought better of the scene it would set.  He didn’t need Kylo Ren to interfere with his command in here; any more than the rest of the ship.  Could he not just return back to his mystical Knights of Ren and leave him in peace to asses whatever he had dragged back for him to sort this time. 

At least Hux noticed; he had upset the medics.  The lead doctor grimacing openly, though with a flash of fear, pretending he was ashamed of his inability to place the specimen on the table; not of Kylo Ren calling him out.  Sheepishly looking at the results on the data pad before him before offering another suggestion, to play to Kylo Ren’s ego.

“A changeling perhaps then Lord Ren.”

General Hux’s teeth set on edge at the man’s crass mistake.  He was the commander in chief of this ship, not the young upstart that had likely decided to bring this thing; whatever he thought it was back.  He should have been the one the physician sought to impress; not immature boy.

“No doctor, a changeling cannot change like that.  They are unable to alter their body-mass; they simply reshape it.”

The doctor flinched at Kylo Ren’s rebuke.  Making General Hux sneer at the small altercation.  Pleased with the physician irritating the knight, though noting with reluctant pride, that the man grovelled at the Knight of Ren out of fear.  Whereas the medic had at least responded to General Hux’s request to show him the specimen out of pure respect.  The mark of a well-trained medical officer responding to his superior’s order as he drew back the entire sheet.

It was a younger medical officer, one still in training who spoke.  The older man having had the experience of years and time served to know when it was time to allow his General the space to think; and to have realised where lay supposed atomically impossible physical features.   

“There are mythical creatures matching her description Sir, but nothing in any medical text to suggest what she is.”

General Hux glowered at the man who spoke.  It was most certainly female; General Hux realised.  Years of conditioning, holding back the anger that he felt as he looked down on the vulnerable naked form.  Though it was the older medical officer who really held the redhead’s ire.  There was no need for such a crude display of her naked body.  A mere description or dignified showing of the different parts would have done.  There was no need whatsoever to display her like an animal.  The younger man had not seemed though to catch the hint.  Instead droning on about her physiological differences; pointing out what the General already could see for himself that she matched his description. 

Mostly she looked like a young and very pretty woman, shapely and very comely to look at. Her long ginger hair hung over her shoulders, an identically coloured patch of short curls between her thighs.  The only things to suggest she was not entirely human, were an additional pair of equally as orange ears.  Small and fox like; poking through the top of her hair.  Then laid under her, and present through her legs; a long bushy tail.  The fur on that fading to a whiter ginger as it progressed, almost blonde at the tip, the only difference he could see between that and a normal woman. 

Barking an order that he had seen enough.  Adding that they all had seen enough, his resolve faded and he gave the order to cover her up.  Ignoring the itch in his fingers that begged him to run his fingers through his own hair.  Closing his nose to the sweet scent of her that mingled in with the harsher smells of the medi-centre.  A young nurse; female Hux noted with relief, hurried to carry out his order Hux making a point to remember the name on her badge.  She looked happy to be resorting some dignity back to the young woman and silently he thanked her.  Though he didn’t miss the reluctance in the chief medical officer’s eyes.  She was a novelty the General realised, something that would be toyed with when his back was turned.  Prodded and poked at, until she yielded up her secrets.  Secrets Hux told himself he should not get involved with.  Not if he wanted to keep his own he chastised himself, as he forced himself to turn and to leave the room.

Already his more adept senses were beginning to register what she was.  Almost as though his eyes had not been enough.  His body responding on auto pilot, to a scent he had old tasted a handful of times and then never this potently.  No, she was most certainly not a myth and it was such a shame that she had allowed herself to be caught.  Sadly, he knew first hand that she was exactly what the myths proclaimed her to be.  Like the past catching up with him, in a way he had foolishly hoped he never had to see. 

Holding his breath against her scent, he carried on walking.  The sweet smell of her tempting him; beckoning him back as he walked past the waiting Kylo Ren.  Refusing to look at the man; ignoring what he knew was most likely an invitation to crow over his findings.  Sweat trickled down his back, as he strove to remain cool and collect to address the room before he left.  Sternly advising the medical officer to inform him when she woke, and to keep her comfortable.  A subtle, but the only way he could permit himself to safely offer her protection.  Ensuring as subtly as he could, that she would be given the chance to wake; and not to fall foul to some needless vivisection. 

Outside the room, he stiffly bided Captain Phasma and Kylo Ren goodbye.  Forcing himself to walk; when instead he wanted to run.  Pretending he hadn’t seen, or felt anything familiar.  Ignoring everyone and pretending that he had not noticed that Kylo Ren seemed to have taken an interest in his passing.  Almost as though the Force user, already knew something was off. 

He could not possibly have realised, he told himself as his feet found the bridge.  The Supreme Leader had assigned the Force user to this very ship, because the walls to General Hux’s mind were so impenetrable.  Locked in place by the Supreme Leader himself to avoid any betrayal.  But even on the bridge he could still taste cloying tendrils of her scent, following him.  Reaching out to him like mindless fingers; trying to temp him back to her side.  His imagination he told himself.  The girl was over four decks below him.  There was no way he could still smell her up here. 

Still the General worked late into the next two shifts.  Remaining awake nearly a full fifty hours, before he considered himself too tired.  Wearied enough, to think about risking returning to his quarters, and not risk silent contemplation about the the girl.  Ignoring the thoughts that reminded him, that he hasn’t already spent hours ignoring the gnawing need in his stomach.  That he was concerned enough to want to go back and to check on her. 

He could not do it he constantly chided himself; it would be professional suicide.  He could not risk letting on what he knew; how he knew what he did.  He was beyond tired; but he pushed himself still.  Worked on another full shift and half of the next, another six hours before he finally gave in to his bodies exhaustion.  Telling himself if he retired now he would actually sleep; that if he did not sleep it would be to his detriment.

That last shift had taken him late into the designated early evening of what would have been a standard Coruscant cycle.  Making him eventually accept his bodies needs for food, and downing a caff flavoured nutrient drink; before he returned to his quarters.  The solid food he had ordered already waiting for him on his coffee table.  The smell tempting him as he stripped off his boots as he entered.  Laying his work tunic over the back of the small sofa, he next stripped down to his undershirt and pants.  Pouring himself whiskey, before sitting to take the small meal. 

He could smell himself; he needed to sleep, but he also needed to shower.  The phantom smell of the woman in the medi bay seemed to have grown worse the wearier he grew.  It was all in his mind, he told himself; deciding that he would first give into the need to sleep.  It was just the safety of his room permitting his imagination to overrun he told himself.  He could shower and clean up after he had rested.

General Hux didn’t even bother to turn the lights on in his small bedroom, as he entered it yawning. He was far too tired to bother in a space he knew well enough by now.  Navigating past the sleekly made small dresser and wardrobe; slipping past the bedside table that stood between his small double bed, and the refresher. 

Again, the scent of the woman assaulted him.  Thought he told himself he was too tired to deal with it now; stumbling to his side of the bed.  Eyes closed to the darkness.  The scent deepened the closer to the bed, something was off he realised.  Had he had fur; each hackle would have been raised.  Kylo Ren had been in here, in his rooms! 

Sniffing he turned around, almost yelping in shock as he demanded the lights on; cursing himself as much as he did Ren as he did so.  He was finally about ready to kill the man for this!

The lights clicked on at a low setting, despite his command to activate not issuing a percentage.  The dull lighting enough to see; but not bright enough to rouse her to sudden wakefulness; doubtless another thing Ren had a hand in.  Cursing himself for his stupidity at not checking first.  General Hux didn’t really need artificial anyway, his night sight wasn’t too bad; or now he listened to it, his sense of smell.  But this for some reason, he had wanted to see with his human eyes.  Had wanted desperately to keep the illusion that that was what he was.  

She had clearly been left for him as a much a taunt as a gift.  Still completely naked, Kylo Ren had placed her, atop of his bed covers.  The natural warmth of her body doing as much as the drugs to keep her asleep. 

She was curled up around herself, legs tucked up under her chin long lashes closed onto her freckle dusted cheeks.  In the medicenter he had had proprietary to keep his eyes from wandering, here there was just him and her.  She would have been beautiful by human standards, and knowing so precious little of his own kind; he thought her exquisite.  Her mouth was full, canines resting on a plush lower lip; a lip his own teeth longed to bite into; before he sucked it into his mouth.  Instantly appalled at his crass musings, and shaking his head to dispel the image of himself giving into that desire. 

General Hux had previous to this, always assumed he was just disinterested when it came to sex.  That it was okay; but he could take it or leave it.  But as his eyes went lower, following the line of her nose and down to where her hair spilled over her shoulder; he realised he had been so wrong.  Drawn closer as though she pulled him with an invisible thread he sat on the bed next to her; his fingers reaching to trail through the silk of her hair.  Milky white flesh hidden amongst the russet the swell of her small and perky breasts; her nipples pebbling like berries to the chill of the room. 

She was as soft as he had imagined her to be, and he knew as he pulled the hair off her shoulder that already his hand would reek of her pleasant smell.  He was almost enchanted by her he realised trailing those fingers back across her clavicle, tucking her hair behind one ear; his lip pulling into a snarl as he bared her throat.

Ren really had gone too far this time he realised, rising quickly from the bed.  All prisoners were fitted with a tracking devise, a metal band that locked onto a wrist or an ankle, but Ren had decided to plat a crude jest this time.  A white band graced her throat, locked in place with a code and a DNA lock.  Normally the code would be stored onto a computer, and his DNA would be high enough for clearance, but he doubted Kylo Ren had implanted the code in the ships computer.  She had been left as a gift alright; but one Ren would have the final say on, one he would own.

Reaching into the cupboards he drew out he greatcoat, laying it over the sleeping form of the Kitsune-girl, more for decency than the warmth.  Whatever that arrogant idiot had gifted her to him for, and he could guess, naked and freshly bathed; he wouldn’t be taking from her, he was above such base needs.  He could bloody well sleep on the couch tonight; tomorrow she would be leaving.                      


	2. Chapter 2

You woke from dreams of running free through Deveron’s lush forests.   Recalling vividly the vibrant colours and scents of greenery; to the stale scents of cold steel and oil and worse.  Covered almost completely, by the overwhelming scent of unknown male musk. 

Not just any male either, this one reeked of alpha pheromones.  Frightened you ran fingers over your neck,  whilst you scrambled to place your back to the wall behind you.  Running your ringers over your neck and shoulders.  Relieved that there were no other ‘marks’ than his scent.  Just the weight of a heavy collar at your neck, the loop on the front a crass show of ownership.  Bringing your knees to your chest, you shuffled to sit up.  Scrambling to stand next to the head of the bed.  Searching the room, as on a defensive auto pilot you looked down at the offending piece of fabric.  Scowling at the gaberwool as you prodded it.  Breathing in heavily to familiarise its scent and frowning.  It was odd to think that another Kitsune would have taken the time to try and preserve your modesty.  Yet the coat was definitely scented with alpha males pheromones. But to think that another of your kind would find the need to cover what the maker had made to perfection was unlikely.  Worse than that, was the lack of the male. Coupled with fuzzy memories that made it difficult to place why you were here. 

You knew with a sinking weight of certainty in your stomach; that you had not consented to being here.  The collar alone was proof that who ever had fetched you here, had intended for you to know that from waking, your rights didn’t matter to them.  As far as you could recall people only collared slaves and animals; and with a shaky breath of fearful anger you realised you were probably both to him.  This entire set up was far too human, for your liking; it reeked of captivity.  Everything you had been warned as a kit, that could happen should the humans realise what you were.

Your species were so very rare, that outside the family unit you could go months; even years without seeing another of your kind.  Then all too often when discovered kitsunes were taken by human masters; to be kept as novel pets.  Granted some treated better than others; but your freedom taken from you either way.  Famed for your novel allure and the monthly heats you entered.  A bottle of alpha male scent; the only thing needed to make females all too willing to accept any of their perverted demands.   

Wiping at your cheek to dab away panicked tears, you swallowed down your fear.  Reasoning that it was pointless to give into panic just yet.  That you were completely to blame for getting yourself caught and what now came.  That now your best and only hope was that the more docile and willing you were; the easier your master would be on you.  Praying to the maker you were not sure you believed in, that this human would look after you; that you had a kind master.     

Prowling the room for clues, only served to calm your restless body.  It brought forth no real suggestions to the kind of human who had taken you in.  Just from the pristinely ironed and folded garments; the realisation that this one was probably very particular.  The sleek angles and sharp chrome corners, suggestive of a modern man.  There was nothing obscene, but it was the kind of simplicity that almost whispered hints of power and from the materials a sort of understated wealth. That, and of course the reek of alpha male; suggested intelligence.  The smell undetectable to humans, was one that he had searched to acquire; he had known what he was doing.     

Where this room was though, was anyone’s guess.  But there was the faint almost untraceable smell of burnt fuel and distant hum of star-ship engines reverberating in the distance.  Echoing through distant chambers suggested you were already far from Deveron’s atmosphere.  This room was huge and contained a bath.  Running water on a space-ship; that usually meant a large vessel.  One more suggestion of wealth; making you wonder just how large this ship was.    

The door was not locked, and thankfully you had spent enough time amongst humans to understand how to work the controls.  Padding silently into a dimly lit room, the size much larger than the bedroom.  One wall of the chamber an immense panel of transparasteel that drew your attention; the window looked out into the vast expanses of space.  The stars rushing past, as you stood and stared; slowly drawing closer to a sleek leather couch facing it; and noticing for the first time the body curled up asleep.

At first you thought him a human.  His hair was a slightly lighter ginger than your chestnut red; less of a burning flame.  More the red that echoed in the morning sun, just as it cleared the horizon.  Messy and full of life, it was untamed and tussled to messy waves as he turned in his sleep; vibrantly thick as your kind had.  Then as you inhaled deeply, tasting his scent on your tongue as much as through your nasal cavities; you realised he wasn’t covered in a synthetic or stolen musk.  Frowning as you looked over him, puzzled that there were no signs of the biological changes that made him what he was.  

He was not the first adult male you had seen, but he was the most beautiful.  His skin pale, and like yours marked in a series of freckles.  Each one dotted amongst the thin, but defined muscles of his chest.  The blanket he had covered himself with fallen to drape between his legs, displaying more of his wiry frame.  His body dotted with a thin covering of masculine hair, thickest at his chest and the thin trail leading to his covered crotch.  

There were no signs of his tail though and gently bending forwards, you touched at his scalp.  Holding onto your breath as you drew closer.  His scent thickest near his neck, where his scenting gland hid under human skin.  It was all wrong you realised; something wasn’t right with this kitsune.  Making you stupidly try to part his hair in search of the ears you knew he should have had in human form.  Stopped by and iron grip on your wrist, making you yelp and try dropping to your knees to add your body weight to your pulling.  Clawing at his grip with your nails to try and dislodge him and then when your scratches didn’t work, resorting to pressing your teeth to him.  Trying to bite into his own wrist.

“Enough!”

The command was not overly loud.  But it was spoken with such a tone of authority that you ceased your struggles immediately.  The male sitting up, the added room permitting you enough space to drop to your knees and gaze up at him.

“Savage little animal aren’t you.”

The murmured drawl as he checked out his wrist, was not in anyway a question.  Neither was his choice of description for you, an observance.  There was such disgust in the way he called you animal; that it shocked you both into silence and stillness.  Horrified now as you looked over him; as to what he was.  He had to be your kind; smells never lied.  People did; but you could scent out a lie, or a falsehood; another gift of your kind.    

But you had never seen eyes that blue on your kind; or for that matter eyes any different to your own amber ones.  Oh, different shades of golden browns granted; but kitsunes always had brown or hazel eyes. Not that beautiful shade of blue that seemed to change with his calming from grey to a light sky blue.  Framed by thick ginger lashes that edged the scornful look he shot you knelt at his feet, with pure fire.

“What are you, mute also; you can clearly understand me.”

For a moment you though about speaking, drawing breath, and raising your chin in defiance to speak back.  Then you thought better of it.  If this so called ‘human’ wanted to lie about his genetics; then you saw no reason to let on that you could speak.  Selectively mute was not the same thing as voiceless; and judging from the look he shot you in answer he could read your body language well enough.  Let him make assumptions about you; he had made enough about himself.

“Well you could at least cover yourself up; flaunting yourself like some slut.”

The command to cover herself up, was coupled with General Hux depositing his blanket over her naked body.  Using her confused painful flinch to the harshness of his words, as breathing space he needed to escape.  Rushing in his under pants towards his bedroom. Pulling down his vest as he hurried to press the control panel to open the sliding doors.  Locking it in place when he was done and pressing his back to the cool metal and breathing deep steadying breaths.  Reasoning with himself that his behaviour was necessary; there was kindness in his cruelty.  Better that she sees now that he was similar, but not the same as her.  He was better than her, not just some dumb animal like his mother; he at least had a human father. 

Safely locked away from her, he ran his fingers through his hair to smooth it back.  The tips running down the twin scars that nestled under his combed back hair. 

The room stank of her, making his hear race.  Drawing blood down to his cock and painfully reminding him of the real reason he had been so hasty to leave her.  Groaning and tightening his fists until well-manicured nails bit into the heels of his palms.  Ignoring the image that he had seen, and the suggestion that he had enjoyed it.  Telling himself that, he, Armitage Hux was not interested in that creature; he was human.  His father had seen to the cosmetic removal of all that made him a kitsune; he passed as human. 

Finished in the shower, he began the daily ritual of shaving.  The suppressants that many other officers took to prevent hair growth, wouldn’t work on his baseline physiology; and so, he had cultivated the supposed ritual of a fussy aristocratic officer.  The straight edged blade and fox hair brush viewed by most as eccentric and not indicative of an incapability.  Brushing back his damp hair and gelling it into an acceptable ordinance of control; once more adding to his appearance.  Cementing his humanity by donning clothing.  Something clearly his kitsune breatharian did not view as necessary.  Grabbing a shirt from the bottom of a draw, he left the bedroom.  Clothed and fully constrained; he was now ready to face her again.  Throwing the grey undershirt at her; snarling an order to put it on as he busied himself brewing tarine and searching the cupboards for something he could feed her.  Finding only cereals, dried fruits, and a tin of fish he had had left over from Millicent.

At that his heart sunk.  The sharp ache reminding him of the four-legged feline he had lost to the destruction of Starkiller.  Unable to rescue when she had run off to find somewhere to hide in all the chaos.  Snarling as he remembered the idiot officer who had failed; even daring to offer his condolences.  Remembering with satisfaction the look of relief on the man’s face when Hux had placed his blaster on the desk and stepped forwards.  Seemingly unarmed as he patted the officer on the shoulder.  Then triggered the catch on the hidden dagger in his sleeve.  Watching with cold indifference as the man slid to the floor of his office.  Clutching at the puncture wound in his stomach. 

General Hux had wanted to wait and watch the man slowly bleed out onto his office floor.  But there had been orders from Snoke to bring him Kylo Ren.  The same idiotic man who had been the cause of the destruction of his base; and the reason that thing was still knelt on his floor.  Now thankfully covered by his t-shirt; but still unwanted.  Another complication arisen from this bloody search for the son of Darth Vader; and the supposed search for his hiding place. 

He was sick of the whining child; and could not fathom why Snoke permitted so many of his failures.  Deciding on the fish, he pulled the lid back and dumped the contents into one of Millie’s old bowls. Adding another of milk, and then carrying them to the waiting ‘thing’.  Placing them much to her badly hidden shock on the floor.  Smirking at he watched her fight between needing food; and not wanting to demean herself by eating from the floor like an animal.  Sitting down to the chair opposite the couch to gloat as he sipped from his tea.  The taste a tangible bitterness as each sip burnt his tongue; numbing the taste buds as he worked through the early morning reports.  Pretending not to notice the longing looks she sent the food bowls; or the rumbling noises of her stomach.  Typing out several reports and dismissing several more before at last paying her honest attention.

“It is fish and nerfs milk; neither will kill you.”

There was scorn in his words.  Clearly, they were meant for the animal he assumed you were.  Placing the datapad on the table, and needlessly explaining to you what it was.  Sipping from the metal canister of tea, as one perfectly polished boot nudged the bowl of fish towards you.  A perfectly shaped brow arching, as he silently dared you to defy his wordless order to eat from the pet bowl.

You could not for the life of you, understand his cruelty.  Nor the pleasure he garnered from watching you dip your head to the bowl.  Sniffing at the food for hints of added ingredients before scooping some of the flaked fish up with your tongue.  Ignoring the metallic canned taste and concentrating on the taste of fish.  Chewing and swallowing daintily before bending to take another, flinching when his shadow fell on you and a gloved hand brushed the tips of your ears.

At once you snarled and ducked from his touch.  Scrambling to face him and baring you canines to him.  The remainder of the food, and all the milk dashed to the floor.  Soaked into the hemline of your t-shirt.  He was displeased, and openly displaying it as he muttered about knowing better than to touch a wild animal.  Frightened that he would hurt you for this, you tensed.  Pulling tight on yourself ready for a cuff or a slap.  Though at once a small droid whizzed from a compartment in the wall.  Buzzing and whirling over the mess until it was gone, leaving only the empty bowls in its wake; and your grumbling belly. 

A deep sigh and he spoke.  Rising to pour more of the blue milk into your bowl.  A calmness to his question, that perhaps suggested he might be reasonable about your fear.

“Can you eat human foods?”

Slowly you dipped your head in agreement.  Surprised that he was about to offer you more food, after the mix up.  Bending to lap the milk up and watch him slyly over the rim of the bowl.  Waiting until he had turned to the datapad and was distracted enough to quickly pick it up.  Downing the contents quickly in a series of small gulps that at first went unnoticed.  Tipping the last of it over yourself as you realised he was watching.  The sneer returning as he stood, lifting from the back of the couch his greatcoat.  The same one you noted by scent, that he had laid over you to sleep.  Pulling it over his shoulders whilst he stood over you.  His height meant to be intimidating as you took it to be whilst he towered over you.  Tilting his head before snatching up the data pad and leaving the rooms.  Leaving you covered in sticky nerfs milk, and more afraid now than you had been before. 

Left alone to his room; also left you to further thoughts on his behaviour.  Huddling up into a ball and whimpering to yourself for comfort.  Tucking your tail around yourself and your arms across your chest; running your fingertips across the metal band at your throat.  Your body warmth heating the milk and tinging it with a souring smell. 

You wanted to remove it; and almost you did.  You had no need of clothing amongst your own kind; only around humans who seemed incapable of understanding that there was nothing crude in being naked.  But the disgusted look he had shot you for being naked; made you think better of it.  It was a much safer idea to remain clothed than to risk his anger.  Admittedly he had yet to hurt you; but his regards for you were the same as one would have for a base animal.  Hitting you would be the least of your problems; already he had collared.  Marked as an inferior. 

Almost you had cried yourself to a hungry sleep; when the whooshing of opening doors woke you.  Scrambling to your feet and waiting as He returned, his movements slow and deliberate as he walked over to a table neat the window.  Pouring himself a small glass of what smelt like spirits. Raising it to his lips and looking expectantly over it at you. His free hand raised to you, his index finger beckoning you forwards.  You wanted to obey; you tried to.  Obedient pets you knew from tails of escaped kitsunes; were better thought of.  But your legs wouldn’t move.  Your bladder suddenly heavy; frightened by a thick sense of annoyance and danger rolling off him. 

“Come here now!”

You still couldn’t move; and so, it was him that came to you.  Shaking you roughly by you collar; his look suggesting you were worse than shit on his shoe.  Trembling as he gripped your face between his fingers and angled your chin to his gaze.

“It seems I am not to be rid of you as soon as I had hoped.  My orders are to keep you here with me; though what need Supreme Leader has for you is beyond me.”    

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay. I'm not sure if I've gone with a traditional kitsune au. But I wanted to try it, so I am going with what I'm imagining.


	3. Chapter 3

Sipping on yet another glass of bitter-sweet whiskey, General Hux scowled.  Both at himself and mammoth task that was to come the next cycle.  Sighing in barely closeted frustrations as he settled back to sit firmer against the heavily padded back of the couch.  Taking a larger sip, as he willed himself to relax, arguing with himself that despite the late hour, he had earnt this drink. 

General Armitage Hux was beyond tired and it had been another long day.  One spent mostly manipulating the Supreme Leaders ego, as he battled with Ren’s idiotic ideals.  Though at last it seemed that Snoke was prepared to listen to reason and logic.  Rather than waste any time going after Luke Skywalker, it had finally been agreed that the First Order would strike.  The entire fleet was already gathering, and that fleet would be by morning poised ready to strike. It was folly to wait for their numbers to increase, for other idiots to join their pathetic cause. 

Come the morning, they would crush the Resistance.  Blowing them to smithereens as they cowered in their hole.  The plan was that rather than wait for the curs to dissolve their camp and lead them to any remaining supporters.  They would instead hunt them down in their very lair.  Trapped General Hux could have his armada pick off those who fled.  Destroying Resistance ships, whilst they also stamped out the remaining leaders.  It would be a good day tomorrow, he had decided; another step towards cementing himself as the First Orders rightful; if not named Grand Marshal. 

Another sigh, and another drink and General Hux relaxed. The Nerf leather at his back warm and supple as it gave way to his frame.  Supporting his weary body, as he drank deeper from the weighted crystalline tumbler.  Mulling over satisfied day dreams, he closed his eyes, another set of thoughts bleeding into his visions of victory.   Replacing his dreams of battle tomorrow, with another of Snokes orders for him.  His gaze never leaving the tiny kitsune laid out before him.  Collared still like the dumb animal she clearly was and fastened by a metal chain.  His pet fastened to a newly added ring in his floor. 

General Hux felt that he had not been overly cruel to his new pet.  Simply that he was indifferent a new one pressed upon him so soon after the demise of poor Millicent.  What was more, he found the suggestion that keep her here in his rooms highly distasteful.  An adult Kitsune was larger than the small house-cat he was used to; though at least easier to train.  But he had simply found having to share his one roomed complex with her an inconvenience to say the least.  So, if he had to it would be on his terms.  A cage had been hastily erected in his bedroom to contain her when he slept or was unavailable.  Her needs were too varied and all too much too human for his liking.  Her intelligence if he was honest was more than that of a pet, but not quite human enough for a companion.  She needed too many things a kitten would not have, though seemed just as curious; just as active.  

As attractive enough to look at as she was, she still took up far too much of both his personal space and his precious time.  Her fulltime custody and care was a bloody nuisance he could well do without right now.  Like this though he could deal with her, laid out to sleep on a gigantic cushion her belly was seemingly full.  So, having had her fill of the treats he left for her to keep her entertained as he worked, she seemed to have decided to doze off.  Her barely clothed form huddled around herself.  Her tail twitching as she whimpered in her sleep, cute little puffs of air rising and falling as she dreamed on.  Watching her like this, he could fully understand how his father had succumbed to a desire to bed his Kitsune-mother.  Her mouth parted, plum little lips muttering wordlessly to herself.  Puckering in a way that just made him think of them pursed around his cock.  Furiously putting that though aside as he sobered up to the realities.  She was an animal and he was a human!  Unlike his father, the late Commandant he could maintain his standards.  How his father could have stooped so low, as to let it happen once he didn’t understand, let alone again and again.  It just seemed to lead to more confused thoughts and feelings about her.  Whilst she seemed fully able to understand him and come the end of a tiresome day; her silence was far better to come home to than an innate gossiping woman.  Her inability to converse with him, was not something he could deal with a long-term partner.  Bedding certainly her was a desire that he could do without ever succumbing to.  He could do without the complications.

Maker, how he wished he had demanded a report, rather than go down there to look.  He had been stupid to think that if he knew of Kylo Ren’s parentage; that the boy did not in turn know of his own.  That beneath his chrome mask of detachment, Kylo Ren was not sniggering at him each time he glanced at him.  Knowing that he was the bastard son of a purebred Imperial bully and some nameless and common piece of vermin.  His mother’s name was not even on his birth certificate.  Probably because she shouldn’t even speak it, let alone write it.  His bloodline was a far cry from the pedigree parentage Kylo Ren heralded from.  Though he though with a smirk; at least Kylo Ren had some criminal smuggler to dilute his prestigious genetics.  The grandson of Darth Vader and Queen Amidala, had a back-water thief for a father and given the man’s sly nature, General Hux found this very fitting. 

“At least he was human.”

Catching himself at the last moment from jumping in shock, General Hux swiftly opened his eyes.  Both ashamed to have almost fallen asleep drink in hand before her.  As he was that Kylo Ren had entered his quarters whilst he was unaware.  Now blinking back his sleep-filled eyes; he slowly squared his shoulders to Ren.  Feigning an alertness and control over the situation that he did not entirely feel.  His face blank of all emotion, whilst he spat the junior man’s name out in greeting. 

“You had orders to breed her did you not General,”

She had it seemed woken to the knight’s intrusion before General Hux had.  Although she had the sense to have laid still and keep herself silent.  But Hux had watched as she flinched at Ren’s crassly-spoken, modulated words.  Realising now why she was being kept, her eyes showing intelligent horror, at Supreme Leader’s reasons for him keeping her.   

Thankfully with his back to the girl, Kylo Ren had not noticed that that she understood the basic tongue.  For all she could not speak it, General Hux was curious to see what else the girl understood of human languages and kept his face devoid of any reaction.  Pretending that there was not a tinge of protection to his actions as he waited.  He was not fearful of what Ren would do once he realised that she had some understanding of his words.  Taking another sip of whiskey, he feigned a sudden interest in the swirling liquid in his glass.  Desperate to hide both his unease and the pure disgust at what had been Snokes instructions.  Reminding himself that if Leader Snoke insisted on this, then he only need provide the raw materials.  He did not need to be physically present for the act; it would be just like breeding nerfs.  The actual act he planned to be carried out by medics, but would she understand that they simply needed her as a vessel.  But watching her try and hide her own reaction as slowly Ren approached the girl, he wondered if he was being a little unkind to have not shared their plans for her future.  The sight of her slight form uncurling from her sleep filled pose, reminded Hux how tiny she really was; how vulnerable.  Especially as she backed off from the threat of the large man who crouched down to better view her. 

Her face unlike General Hux’s hidden visage was an open and honest show of fear.  Silently watching the room for dangers too herself as she shuffled back from Kylo Ren.  Her eyes petitioning General Hux as she struggled, before deciding it was better to bare her canines.  Unable to move as far away from the approaching Commander as she clearly wanted to.  Stopped by the tension on the chain at her neck.  The one Hux had placed there, to fasten her to the floor.  A heavy loop pinning her in place; just like a frightened and leashed pet.  The same chain he suddenly felt very guilty to have placed her in. 

“It is not all that simple Ren.”

Why he was making excuses for not wanting to lay with an animal; General Hux would never know.  Surely it was enough just to say that he didn’t want to demean himself.  But knowing that orders, were orders he had done his research and therefore spoke the truth.  He doubted that when Snoke had given his orders to breed her he had meant it as a loose term and if he wanted results it really was not going to be as simple as Ren was making it out to be.  Like humans she would have brief window of fertility.  But unlike humans, the conception rate was much lower.  Especially, he thought with a barely concealed smirk, when he was covertly feeding her wuppa tea. Which after rigorous checks to the medical banks was unknown by First Order medics as a Ho’Din contraceptive.

“Surely you wish to fulfil your orders General; can her heat not be medically induced?”

Despite the modulator; there was mockery from the human male, and you could almost smell the threat he would present if given challenge.  It hung thick with human aggression and pheromones in the air between your master and himself.  Unable to look away, you just stared.  Refusing to make eye contact; but trying to make yourself unnoticeable.  Wide eyed and panicked you did what any animal would do, keeping your eyes trained on the new threat.  Almost ready to if needed chew your arm off to be free.  Unlike the one known as General Hux this one seemed far less predictable in his behaviour.  Crueller and far more interested in hurting others. 

The male who’s chambers you were kept in; you learnt not from a polite introduction, but from interactions with actual humans, was named General Hux.  You had also learnt that he was not a particularly pleasant man.  Nor was he pleased at having to keep you.  Loudly insisting that if he had to keep you with him, it would be like some pet and caged if needed.  You were to be kept collared and to be fed from animal bowls.  Now he was angry and if it was not already both terrifying and humiliating enough to be chained to the floor like cornered prey.  Then the immense hulk of the crouching man before you made it worse, taunting you by reaching to touch you as you slid back from him.  If the thought of not seeing Deveron again.  Of being imprisoned in this metal box of a ship, was bad enough; then what was to come next could be far worse.  Clearly if shit rolled down hill; you were at the bottom of the pile.   So, it was all the more imperative that he had to believe that you were some dumb animal; you had to keep quiet.  They had to doubt your intelligence; they had to doubt you could escape.

You had of course been careful over the last week to appear less intelligent than you were.  Drawing on the Generals odd naivety, in a vain hope that it would prevent opportunities to you.  Ones that would not be given to a more intelligent animal; a sentient prisoner for example.  Hoping against all hope that he would not have known what your kind were secretly famed for.  Praying that your last hormone injection would last long enough for you to make your escape.  Especially given his conversation with General Hux; the one you preyed you had not accidently just let on that you now fully understood.  You could not go into heat around him; the consequences of him claiming you as a mate were too high.  Too wrong. 

A tug on the chain, meant that you had reached as far back as it’s short length would let you.  Panicked you acted quickly and in defence you snarled, only registering at the last moment that you had sunk your teeth into his fingers.  Scissoring them over them in a move that even with your sharper canines you knew would at best only bruise.

“Desist!”

Ashamed you let go of the man’s hand, tucking yourself in on yourself.  The oversized shirt flopping over your scraped knees as you wrapped your arms around them.  You had been that frightened that you had forgotten the man who had chained you was still here with you.  Now he had stood in challenge to the human, snarling with indignant rage as he spoke.  Enunciating his annoyance to this Ren; for all you were not entirely sure it was not you he was cross at.   

“Unless you have word on the fleet, get out of my quarters.”

For all General Hux smelt of Kitsune male, there had never been evidence of it.  Even when he showered and changed before bed, hair rumpled and bare legged in his towel.  There was no physical evidence that he was of your kind; but why else would his orders have been to breed you?  Now as he stood to face the bigger male, his actionable defence was too feral; to be entirely human.  He had not yet gone for the masked intruder, but there was a flash of fire in his eyes that made this Ren leave the room.

Refusing to look at either male.  You listed to the thud of heavier sulking boots as they stormed to the door, and then the patter of a more graceful adept stride as it came towards you.  Flinching though not drawing away when he crouched to you.  Speaking with a lowered tone, though one that still carried so much authority and command for all he tried to be soothing.

“How much of my words are you able to understand?”

When you struggled for words; hoping that you could still play off ignorance, he hooked a forefinger under your chin.  Pulling you up to look at him, though your eyes still refused to meet his gaze.  Obeying that basic instinct not to look your challenger in the eyes.  Not to let him believe that you could be a threat to him. 

“Look at me.”

You had every intention of refusing his coaxing demands.  Until he shifted onto his knees to lower himself closer to your level.  A thumb brushing your cheek, whilst his other hand pushed hair from your eyes.  The gentler action catching you off guard and lowering your defences.  Making you for the first time permit yourself to look directly into his eyes.  Taking a breath before you spoke.  Both to steady yourself and to offer up surrender.   

“All of it.”

Your voice was muted with disuse, though still humble for the admission of your muteness.  Cheeks darkening as he sighed and pursed his lips together; shaking his head at you.  His look one now of rebuke.  His eyes narrowed as you blushed at the lie that had never been spoken.  Lowering you eyes from him as you whispered a plea to him rather than an explanation; he shouldn’t need an explanation.

“Please don’t hurt me.”

General Hux had been unkind and degrading in his behaviour; but he had never been too cruel in his treatment of you.  Even now you suspected it was disappointed frustration that he felt, rather than anger.  Still you made yourself be small again.  Laying your forehead on your knees as you spoke and hiding your face from him; hoping that this would all go away. 

He made no immediate move to answer you.  Simply stroking at the top of your hair until you grew brave enough to tilt your head to the side.  Resting your cheek on the tops of your knees and watching him as he carded the top layer of your hair with his hand.  Sighing before he spoke again, this time wearied and with less surety.

“It seems that you have succeeded in making an idiot out of me; who else knows you can talk?”

Eyes widening, you stared a moment shocked.  Oddly unsettled that he was taking this so well for all he seemed to think it personal to him.  After all he was the one who had decided you were a dumb animal; and started treating you like one.  Who else had decided on collaring you; and making you sleep in a cage; of degrading his own kind?  Blinking you drew a breath to calm your thoughts.  Forgetting your anger before you would trust yourself to speak again.  this time full of protest and assurances for him.     

“No one; you seemed very keen that I was some sort of creature; why would I choose to enlighten you?!”

At that, Hux stared at the girl.  Thoroughly ashamed with himself; though pride would never let him admit it.  In her indignancy, she had inadvertently raised both her spine and chin; though at first, still keeping her knees tight to herself.  Another show of an intelligence she had kept from him.   Probably waiting as much for him to show if he should punish her little deception.  Relaxing under his silence and dropping both legs to cross under one another when he instead paused in question.  Tapping a single finger to his closed lips as though debating if he should engage in a punishment or chastisement; rather than hide his annoyance at himself.  It was arrogant to assume that just because his mother had never been permitted to raise him; that it was a lack of her intelligence.  Already he had learnt that it was folly to believe every word of the abusive bully who was his father.  The one who refused all but the most basic of questions on his other physiologies.   

Her silence too, must have been so very strenuous on her.  Especially given that tonight was not the first time he had suspected she understood him and that she had done well not to speak before Ren.  Suddenly he felt less triumphant about tomorrow and far more wearisome that he had a right to.  He decided that there had been enough conversation tonight; tomorrow he should be well rested for his victory.  Instead like every other night, he instructed her to go use the refresher and prepare herself for bed.  Ignoring the guilt, he should have felt as he tucked her into the large cage that held her bed.  Nodding at her quietly and polite spoken thank you when he asked if she was warm enough.  Tomorrow was another day; and perhaps if it went well Supreme Leader might relieve him of his duties to her.        


	4. Chapter 4

You hadn’t really slept.  So, when the shrill ringing of an alarm woke General Hux up, you settled back down under the covers.  Hiding yourself completely under them, creating a barrier from the harshness of his bedroom lighting.  Pretending that you had not heard him wake, or that you were watching him as he moved about his room.  Clearly both very pleased with himself; and less exhausted than you would have expected from the short passing of time he had had to rest in. 

Pulling on fresh clothing and sparing not a single glance back at you as he left the room; which was hardly unusual.  Purely for your genetics, you were already beneath his opinion of what was acceptable and so he seemed to hate having to even look at you.  General Hux, simply thought you beneath him.  He held no real regards for you and he resented having been forced to keep you.  Therefore, after your deception how much more did he hate looking at you, being reminded that you had gotten one over on the famous General of the First Order.  You had managed to make an idiot of him, alienating the male who had at least taken it upon himself to feed and water you.  The same one who had at least stood up for you. There was a smug excitement to his actions, and when you scented the air a thicker concentrate of his alpha pheromones.  Almost like a pet dog, ready to piss up against the wall; eager to show he was in charge here.  That he could not be bested, he was eager for both a fight and to draw first blood. 

Alone and still locked in your cage, the lights remained only a scant while longer before the motion sensors switched them off.  The room sinking slowly into darkness, broken only by the hum of engines and then the whir of the closing blast shields over the view ports.  The darkness leaving you with nothing else to do, but to curl up and whimper to yourself.  Tucking your tail around yourself for comfort and trying to avoid the sickening thoughts of what was to come.          

To be honest his orders to have sex with you, had not come entirely as a shock.  That someone wanted you for sex was to be expected; it was why you feared being found out.  The very reason you had so far avoided humans who knew what you were, the reason you had ran the day of your capture.  But that someone else was directing General Hux to use you and not themselves was odd.  So was the order that there was to be a result from the sexual advances.  That was very so very different than you had expected; or heard of.  There was nothing overly special about your abilities, why would his Supreme Leader need more of your kind.

At some point sleep must have finally happened for a loud bang to have woken you.  Startling to a couched position and sniffing the air for any clues, as subsequent bangs were heard.  Violently shaking the room you were in and making you whine in panic at the distant waffs of fire. Molten metal and the smells of blood and burning flesh slowly growing stronger at time went by.  Ears straining to concentrate not on the sounds of breaking china and knickknacks; but to listen for clues as to what was going on.   

Meanwhile General Hux was livid; snarling with fear filled rage. Earlier he had left Snoke’s throne room with the highest of hopes.  Filled with a savage security, that given the destruction of the Resistance’s starfighter and the last of their fuel waning to nothing; it was only a matter of time.  Already they had proven the capability of one of his latest inventions; the ability to track their ship through space. Now the battle had taken a direct turn for the worse; and the Supremacy was in ruins. 

For all General Hux knew that the Resistance was cornered; the destruction their last vile act of defiance upon the Mega Class Stardreadnaught was beyond petty.  It had been a beautiful ship.  Perhaps the absolute pinnacle of all of his star-craft designs.  Now it was almost sundered in two. All the battle technology lost, alongside the ship.  The remaining crew ordered to evacuate the ship, whilst he of all people had to inform Leader Snoke.  The only gambit he had to save both his skin and his pride; the location of the remaining members of the Resistance.  A paltry offer of a plan for revenge; but one he hoped would excuse his failures.  The First Order had both money and resources, the Star Dreadnaught could be replaced; but intel was priceless.  It was irreplaceable, especially given who he now knew was aboard the escaping ships.  He had to make it to Leader Snoke, to let him know that his wonderful apprentice had failed in killing his mother.  What made it all the sweeter, was the spiteful knowledge that Snoke would have Kylo Ren humiliated, before he also had him murder his mother.  General Hux smirked, it was good to know that despite his failures, he brought something to the table that would hurt Kylo Ren; something that made his own lack of success at least palatable.   

Striding from the hangar he sadly would be missing the execution of the traitor that had cost him Starkiller.  But Phasma would do her duty and no doubt take pleasure in it.  Like himself, she seemed to understand the need to tie up loose corners and leave no threat unexecuted.  For the time being, she saw as he did; she was useful.  Admittedly the moment she was not, he would like he had every other obstacle remove her.  For now, as she had Starkiller, he would allow her to escape. 

He had almost made it to the turbo lift for the throne room when a stabbing pain of remorse stopped him.  Reminding him of someone who had not made it off Starkiller.  Prompting him to think of someone else who would not make it from the Supremacy if he did not act.

Groaning he turned on his heels, this time his pace was not the hurried march to an organised destination, but a panicked run.  Turning the corridor that lead towards his quarters; groaning to find the way blocked and impassable to an adult.  Worried at the scent of death and destruction behind it.  Plus, if he was honest to his kitsune-side and scented deeper, a frightened little kitsune female.  One he could imagine terrified to be trapped in her cage; unable to escape whatever was coming towards her. 

Hands tightening into fists, his own smaller canines bared as he snarled in desperation at the situation he had put her in.  Summoning both repair and service droids to her aid.  Ordering them to quickly clear the blockage.  Pacing desperately in small circles of despair until he could get to her.  The guilt of leaving her trapped in her cage, of treating her like some dumb animal was eating him up. Last night, he had been that annoyed that he had not even bothered to ask her for her name.  Now a strange emotion, one he had not felt since boyhood started to creep up on him.  One that he thought; no not thought.  One that he had fervently hoped that he would never have to feel again.  He was ashamed of what he had done, of why he had done it.

It seemed that they were not working fast enough for his anxiety, the rescue attempt was taking far too long.  Then when a woman’s scream sounded, piercing and petrified; General Hux did the only thing he could.  Convinced it was her, he forgot the dangers ahead and running forwards through the partially cleared rubble ducked.  Climbing and crawling through the mangled wreckage until finally he managed to make it through to the other side of the corridor.  The passageway and his quarters, thankfully still intact; for all the main lighting seemed not to work.

Lit by a pale glow he fought to open his door, then when finding the mechanism broken shot at the controls.  Using his blaster-power to disengage the lock manually and pushing it forwards to find his quarters a mess. 

He had already known he would not be returning to these quarters; and there was nothing of any real worth left here.  A detached man; General Hux kept nothing of any sentiment.  The death of beloved Millicent having been the last thing from his childhood to go.  He missed her, but even he could see where the sentiment he had felt for her held him back.  Still she had only been one small cat and therefore permissible in the grand scheme of things.  His final act upon her death had been to completely cut himself off; to kill the boyish part of him that had chosen to keep her.  To remove all attachments; all to save the man he was now.  It was the heartache that came with such sentiments, as to why he was seemingly uninterested in the company of women.

Now pacing into the room, his heart stopped at the frightened little thing before him.  She seemed to have instinctively known something was wrong.  The air stank of her fear and terror piss, making him kick himself for not having stopped to unlock the cage that morning.  It had been for petty revenge he had locked her in; something he was deeply ashamed of himself for.  Whilst he had looked forwards to her desperate pleas for him to hurry and let her out to use the refresher when he came home drunk on victory.  There had never been this level of malice intended in it all.

Approaching the cage he unlocked it, crooning soothingly in an attempt to encourage her to come out from under the blanket she was huddled under.  Eventually giving up and crawling into the small space to uncover her, ignoring the dampened spot near the entrance.  Reaching forwards to tuck her hair back and stroke her neck; making a play for the scent gland there.  More encouragement to get her to stop shaking and listen to him.

“We need to get out of here.  The ship is going to go down soon; I need you to come with me.”

Her eyes were wide and glazed over with frightened shock; but she still nodded her acceptance.  Earlier her refusal to speak would have bothered him; but for now, he was just thankful that she was following his lead and exiting the cage.  Standing on trembling legs and peering around in the darkness whilst he took her hand and pulled her to the door.  Her footsteps following his own, her face blankly following until he reached the door and she hesitantly pulled back. 

“What is it; we need to leave little-kitsune.”

He had spoken carefully as not to break whatever spell was making her forget her fear and follow him.  She had been moving and he needed her to keep going.  There would be a quick detour to Snokes throne room, then he would get her safely aboard the Command Shuttle.  First, he had to drop Kylo Ren in it with Supreme Leader.

“No.”

You shook your head as you spoke.  The shock on his face making you realise that he was desperate; but not as much as was frightened for you. 

“My skin; I can’t leave it here.”

Your explanation should have meant everything to another kitsune; so, his confused frown worried you into a more detailed explanation.  Adding that you needed your other skin, not the one you stood before him in.  You meant your fox-skin, the other skin he too should have; the one you had always assumed that he had; but kept hidden from you.  The one he should have instinctively understood was to how he was to keep you imprisoned.    

“I don’t have it! Your fox-skin is not on this ship; perhaps another my own maybe.”

He wasn’t lying; and that terrified you.  Without that skin, you could not change from your human-like self; and whomever had it controlled yourself.  It was the ultimate hold on any kitsune.  Rooted to the spot you only followed the firm pull that led you from the room, when he promised you that he would find it.  Knowing deep in your bones that it was still about.  That had it been destroyed that you would appear far more human even than you did now. 

Accepting that General Hux was telling you the truth and believing through his certainty that he would honestly find it from you; you allowed him to lead again.  Following him from the room and into a less darkly lit corridor, following his lead away from the wreckage that spanned on end of the corridor.  His hand pulling her along towards the one room he knew he would have to check first.  Knowing that if he willingly left the Supremacy for the Finalizer without Supreme Leader then both their lives would be even more shorter than already expected.  Hoping with a smirk, that his action would curry him a favour or two with Snoke; or would at the very least put him a point or two above Ren. 

The absolute carnage that hit him when he reached Snoke’s throne room stopping him short in his tracks.  Shocked that unlike the small female, he had not been able to scent out the surprise waiting for him.  The littered bodies revealing as he prowled closer, a dead or unconscious Kylo Ren sprawled on the floor.

At first you had tried to follow General Hux, then at a gestured command to stay put, held back.  Watching with wide eyes the male stalk forwards, his actions now as he prowled the room for survivors, perhaps the most fox-like behaviour you had ever seen him exhibit yet.  His head tilting to allow his gaze to settle on an unconscious black clothed figure.  The same one who had decimated the village you had been visiting before giving the order to have you chased down.  The man who you knew was responsible for the animal collar around your neck. 

General Hux had reached the unconscious man, his snarl less pronounced than your own; but still there.  Pleasure adding to his visage at finding the human male at his mercy, adding to the nod of encouragement you gave as he slowly reached under his coat for what you hoped was a weapon.  Hope kindling that perhaps if this male really was to be forced to be your mate, there was something to work with.  That perhaps he moved to protect you like a true alpha-male Kitsune should; your heart plummeting to your stomach as the figure on the floor moved and General Hux straightened up his coat.

There were arguments between them over how the mess had happened.  Though you paid them little attentions, picking between the red armoured bodies along the outskirts.  Trying to find the source of the lingering human female scent that clung in pockets around the room.  Frowning as you looked over at the tall dark headed male, the scent thickest around him. 

Their argument seemed to be over, your given mate struggling to breath and your legs locked in place.  A tightening of your own throat making you drop to your knees; panic over ruling every other thought as you gasped for air.  Your lungs unable to pull in the much needed fresh oxygen; confused as to what was happening adding to your fear.  Your visions spinning to black; whilst General Hux declared him the new Supreme Leader an action which pulled your consciousness back to alert panic.  Frightened at what the change of leadership meant for you since the giant staring over at you, made your blood run cold with dread. His eyes full of hate, bubbling alongside fire and brimstone, making you wish you were suddenly invisible.  His sneer given first to General Hux, then to you; leering at the collar around your neck before he ordered the redhead to follow him.  Instructing him to fetch his pet too, the word making you almost feel sick with frustration.  His actions not that of a man who would let you off the previous leader’s wishes for you. 

The male that you had been previously warming to, a pathetic pile of reddened flesh gasping in fresh breaths of air.  His attention obviously returned to his own survival, and not your own as you shivered, wrapping your arms around yourself and missing the command for you to follow both men from the room.  General Hux needing once more to manhandle you to your destination, pushing you along with him through the room.  Stopping to kick an unarmoured man, bidding him a bitter farewell and announcing him to you as his previous commander in chief. 

His hand no longer as welcome as it had previously been, as he used it to guide you along.  Onto a busy hanger, and a waiting black vessel.  Rushing you along and into a waiting chair, ordering you st sat put; whilst he kept his attentions firmly on the pacing Supreme Leader.  Pulling down the hem of the shirt he had given you to use as clothing down, and muttering something about it being indecent.  As he rushed to another compartment of the ship; leaving you alone with a man who clearly hated you only fractionally less than he did General Hux.  His colossal boots stamping small patterns on the durasteel floor whilst you curled up as best you could on the shuttle seat.  Watching the predator in the room as he studied you, his feet only finding rest in the seat behind you, as the ship began to rattle.  The inertial dampeners making the take off as smooth as possible whilst with the evilest of sneers he leaned over to you.  Tucking a finger under the collar you wore and using it to drag you onto the floor.  Skinning your knees as he threw you besides his feet.

“General Hux may have mistaken you for human, but rest assured I have not forgotten what you are.  Animals belong on the floor; especially mute, useless ones like you.  You haven’t even managed to fulfil the role you were procured for.”                                       


	5. Chapter 5

You had clearly been heading somewhere.  The General leaving you alone in the small space occupied by Kylo Ren.  The titanic warrior silent, his attention faced inwards as he simmered in silence throughout the entire journey.  Not even paying you enough attention to avoid stepping on you out stretched hair when he rose at last to join General Hux.  His arrival in the cock pit signalling the end of the flight, and General Hux’s domination over it all. 

First was, the raised sounds of angry muffled challenges.  Then slowly the wafting scent of an annoyed alpha kitsune male.  One who seemed to despite the challenge of a larger male was refusing to give up control gracefully.  Or to your horror accept when he was faced with an undefeatable male.  Kylo Ren looking back at you pointedly as with a flick of two fingers, he closed the partition door to General Hux.  Followed by a loud thud and then more muffled sounds suggesting a further struggle for control.  From what you could gather, neither of them wanted to give up control.  Then inside your windowless room, you had not been oblivious to the sounds of battle outside.  Nor had it been possible not to scent out the singe of ion canons and rapid blaster fire.  More shouting from the cockpit of the shuttle then had rang out like a crack, this time loud enough to decipher. 

“That’s enough!”

It was your Alpha yelling, clearly being permitted to take control, then after had come a cease to their firing.  The thudded half run of the wolf-like human disappearing in a flurry of black as he went running through your holding cell, to the access ramp.  Clearly by his hurried and harried pace in challenge to something.  The bay behind you opened to a blinding white sea of what appeared at first to be a barren planet, leaving you alone.  Your feel had made their own mind for you before you had realised you were on the move.  Your heart stabbing painfully as your head tried reasoning with your body at what you had left behind.

Had you posseted it, then it would have been a simple enough task to put it on.  Escape would have been easier with the speed of four legs instead of two and in your fox-form you were smaller; hiding would be easier.  But you didn’t have it and General Hux had never given an offer to help you to find it.  Simply assuring you it was not aboard the Supremacy when you had fled it.  It was a hard choice to take to leave it behind.  Still, you took it.  Positive that given what little he knew of your species, he would not know how to destroy it if he found it.  Praying to the maker herself, that General Hux would not do anything vindictive in retaliation for this escape.     

So you ran away; shoeless and barely dressed it was a stupid mistake.  Yet freedom beckoned you into the harsh light of the mineral crusted planet and away from the captivity of the command shuttle.  Only noticing too late that this escape would be anything but easy.  Behind each footfall you left a breadcrumb trail of red dust.  Your trail too easy to pick out against the bleached upper crust of what smelt like salt.  Aware given the lack of immediately source of moisture apparent when you scented the wind, that you would probably die here.

It would be on your terms though, and not that of a man who wanted you for nothing more than breeding stock.  You would rather die a free woman, than live as a First Order prisoner; especially under the newly proclaimed Supreme Leader.  The memory of his sneer alone, was enough to make your legs falter, wanting to find a bolthole to whine and curl up on yourself like a small pup.  There was an angry shout behind you.  One that you ignored to add more speed to you flight.  Hoping for more cover once you go far enough away.  Or that given the battle you had fled from, you would simply be too much trouble to bother to find.

Inside the command shuttle General Hux cursed and ran.  Not after the Supreme Leader as his men may have thought, but the girl who fled from him.  Roaring out a command to return to him, as much in panic as a chance to relieve himself of some pent-up emotions.  Grateful for the trail of wind blurred footprints that would lead him to her location once this battle was over.  He had not time to deal with her now.  Now the overgrown toddler that was proclaiming himself Supreme Leader demanded his attention.  His inability to understand the basics of how an army worked, meant without his expertise everything he had built would collapse.  There would be no First Order for him to rule over, if he did not take out Kylo Ren.  But firstly, he had to keep the First Order alive, he had to protect his investment.  The side of him he had inherited from his mother, hated to think of her out there alone.  But he had his duty to fulfil first, duty would always have to come first.

Inside the hanger Kylo Ren waited.  His fists clutched tightly around nothing, the leather squeaking in time with the creaking of his teeth as he ground them together.  Where as General Hux felt anger towards Kylo Ren for his failure, he could also see the bigger picture. The Resistance where no more.  None of those who had escaped, would never matter to the First Order.  They were too few to matter to the might that was his polished army.  Hux had blasted the last of their star ships from the space around Crait, they had not the resources or funds to finance another fleet.  He only wished he could see the look on their precious princess, when she realised the true price of her failure.  When disheartened and chased to the very corners of the galaxy her own followers turned on her. 

“Destroy everything, I want this base burnt to the ground.”

General Hux looked towards Kylo Ren, only catching the shock from showing openly on his face at the last possible moment.  Instead swapping it for an open grimace of distaste at his order.  The man really had no idea of how things worked.  Quickly he countermanded the order, pleased when his ground troops listened to him and swiftly moved to retrieve the data banks from the old Rebel Alliance machinery.  Droids scanning the remaining area for anything hidden as Stormtroopers set M-12 sweep bombs to key points on the walls of the cavernous base.  Set to blow once the shuttle had lifted from the planet’s surface.  The officers pacing around, to supervise; making General Hux’s presence almost surplus.  A true show of an intelligent and well led leadership.  One which it had been created by his own fair hands.  The proving that he at least was suited to lead the First Order through this new period in its greatness.    

“Where is your little pet?”

Head tilted to one side, General Hux raised a brow towards the Knight.  Not as a request to clarify the question, or to accede to the threat behind it.  Kylo Ren too was aware she had bolted, but unlike General Hux; he was a simpering mess of emotions.  Kylo Ren was annoyed, and unlike the General, he was too given to those inadequacies brought on by his failure to capture the scavenger.  Kylo Ren for all his human genetics, was more prone to the animalistic side of fear.  His new Supreme Leader was wounded and to try to even the playing fields would now seek to hurt others.

“She has bolted, no doubt taken the chance of some exercise.  I would think even you would have the intelligence to realise that a ship in not the place for a captive wild animal, she needs exercise Ren.”

General Hux’s ensured the timbre of his voice was enough to mislead Kylo Ren.  Adding an extra layer of annoyance to the unspoken suggestion that he should have the kitsune on a tighter leash.  Hiding the guilt that he felt towards her when he spoke of her as an unintelligent animal, rather than the cleverly manipulate woman that she was.  Only a smart person would think to feign an animal like intelligence, to allow herself to become what her jailers thought she was, in order to survive.  She had run rings around him to keep herself safe.  Now General Hux lied too; he kept what she really was a secret.  Telling himself that he did it to save himself the hassle of looking a fool, rather than to keep her safe.  He did not care what Kylo Ren thought of her.

“Not to worry General, we are almost done here.”

This time General Hux did wince.  Trust Kylo Ren to delve closer to the truth than most did, then to completely miss the real point of what General Hux meant.  Hux thought through Ren’s words as he returned to the Command Shuttle.  Careful to move in synchronised step with the broad shoulders of Kylo Ren.  Determined that he would not be seen as less than the General of the First Order to his men.  There had been a mocking tone in Ren’s voice, and another promise of a threat yet to be extracted.  One that almost made him shudder in open fear of what Kylo Ren was likely to insist on performing on the little kitsune for her punishment.  Whatever it was, it would most likely not be a subtle act.  Doubtless it would be something more indicative of Ren’s idea of what made a good leadership.  A show of brute force and fear, rather than gentle diplomacy and a more lasting sense of punishment.  Fear rarely taught anything worth keeping, rather she would just learn to wait for a more secure opening next time.

The Command Shuttle was just as confining as it always felt when the broiling mess of Kylo Ren was aboard it.  Only this time as it sped off in the direction the kitsune had left, it felt even smaller.  General Hux beginning to worry at the missing red tracts in the planet’s surface, that should have denoted the path she had taken.  The red soil once again, covered in white, blown over with the fresh layer of snow-white salt.  In truth he was worried about her safety.  But he knew better than to display that weakness to anyone; least of all Kylo Ren.  Better that she was lost to him permanently.  Or that he had to secretly employ a bounty hunter to bring her back to him; than the General of the First Order risk painting a target on his back.  He unlike Kylo Ren had the intelligence of a true leader, it was only a matter of time before everyone else realised that too.  He was born for the role of Supreme Leader, Kylo Ren had simply assimilated the role.  

“Deploy the trackers.”

Kylo Ren’s drawled command, displayed a nonchalance that was at complete odds with how General Hux felt.  The trackers where drones.  Designed originally by Hux to hunt down missing vehicles and stolen ships.  Their design was pretty similar to General Hux’s seekers, in that they could be deployed to work as weapons.  These ones though programmed to also relay visual information on their intended targets, whilst their drone-like ability enabled the controller to take command should human intervention be needed.  Simply put Kylo Ren intended to hunt her down like a dog.

She had chosen to run, he reasoned.  The order was still acceptable despite the crudeness in its execution.  Yet as he gripped the back rest of the co-pilots chair his eyes searched the horizon.  Eager to be the first to see her, to at least know she was safe.  Somewhat relieved when one finally relayed a thin trail of red footprints.  The lone track leading to a trotting figure, wearied but determined to keep going.  Her russet lengths, sweat plastered to her back in messy waves and fragile skin reddened from the exposure to the harsh sun.  Feet clearly sore, she kept running at a shuffling gait that made General Hux’s heart ache in sympathy.  She was so delicate.  Frightened, and alone, she would rather face the uncertainty of the planet than trust that he, General Armitage Hux would protect her.

“Change course, bring us to her location.”       

The words spoken by Ren were the first that Hux had ever agreed with whole heartedly.  Watching as the tracker followed her, the viewer relaying the same sad image of her trotting along the same path.

Of course, despite him looking out for her, it was Ren who saw her first through the tinted view port of the shuttle.  The General having taken his eyes off the trail they were following to acknowledge the docking of the final tracker within the ships mainframe.  Still the palpable relief he felt at knowing she was still alive making him almost sway with dizzied breaths.  Giving his order to the shuttle’s crew and making his way past Ren. 

“Adjust speed accordingly and lower the ramp. I will collect her myself.”

General Hux had begun depositing his greatcoat on the back of a chair.  Placing his tunic atop of it, open and sprawled in what he subconsciously registered as a small make shift bed.  Ordering someone to fetch him water ready.  Vaguely hearing Kylo Ren mutter something to one of the pilots, before addressing General Hux himself.   

“As you wish General.”

There was an audible smirk in Kylo Ren’s voice.  Not just that of a man who was letting his General know that he was humouring his orders.  No there was something else there.  Something that made the hairs on the back of his neck stand up in alarm for the kitsune.  Still whatever it was, it could wait until he took her from the heat of this planet and at least had her hydrated enough to answer for her insubordination.  Nodding to the officer who stood by the access hatch he jumped from the slowly moving craft.  Trudging across the windswept salt flats to the kitsune.  Mildly pleased, but not at all shocked to see her change course and try and run from him.  The marks that she left behind showing that the red of the soil was not all that marked the salt.  The girl had run until her feet were bloody, and then she had kept on going despite the obvious pain she must be in.

His first act as he approached her was to shout an order to come back.  Unperturbed when she shook her head and kept going.  Her wind and sun chapped arm waved back at him in an obvious dismissal of both the order and then the anger he felt in her refusal to see sense.

 

Escape in its traditional form, had never really been what you had expected when you had fled the ship.  Yet as time had gone on, you had truly hoped that you where free at least from the First Order.  The horror at hearing the whirrs of ion-engines swiftly approaching making your feet sluggish.  The fear of what was to come if you where caught, making your body resist the surge of energy that your adrenaline tied to provide you with.  Chancing a glance back at the stoically approaching General Hux.  His red hair flying everywhere in the winds of the downwards engines, and the naturally produced breeze of the planet.     

At first you wanted to scream back your refusal.  Then as you looked back to the man stood at the access hatch; you remembered with a jolt why you could not let on that you could talk.  Catching yourself before the shaking of your head could be seen as too intelligent a refusal.

“You’ll die out here, come back.”

This time you wanted to scream at him.  To remind him that he didn’t care what happened to you.  Scared that now General Hux was a lot closer than before.  His longer, booted strides threatening to soon catch up with you for all he clearly refused to run after you.  Instead letting the lethargy of your dehydration and expended energy close the gap for him.  Scowling as he came close enough to see you panting against the fleeting energy levels and the throbbing demands of the soles of your feet.  Taking pity on yourself to offer up another bargain.  One that was less of a threat to what would happen if you stayed, more of a reason to give in.

“Look, if you come back now you won’t be punished for running.” 

It was tempting to give in to that offer.  Your feel faltering underneath you almost in a sentience of their own, to the offered respite.  Truly you were exhausted.  Your hair and clothing soaked through with moisture you could not afford to spare.  You could not decide which was worse.  The salt dried skin of your mouth and lips; or the stabbing sting of each hurried step away from approaching shuttle.         

“Little Kitsune stop, you cannot keep this up forever.  Do not anger Kylo Ren any more than you have by running.”

General Hux was close enough now that his voice could dip to a quieter offer of sincerer honesty.  He truly had no intentions of harming her.  This far from Ren his words where highly unlikely to carry on the wind.  So he had chosen to allow the fear he felt for her to hinder his words.  Unsure for her safely if she did not comply with Ren’s unspoken order to bring you back to the First Order.  The tone hopefully spoke of a softer man than the one he knew she had seen.  The one who sneered at every subordinate like they were barely worth the space of air they occupied.  Almost giving in and reaching to catch her when she tripped over a harder lump of rock.  Stumbling onto grazed and now bloodied knees.  Continuing crawling as desperately she carried on away from him.

General Hux had to concede he had tried his best to do this without violence and aggression.  Now as she fell forwards, yet still managed to continue her journey, he could feel himself left with little of a choice as to how to procced with the female.  Now there was barely any distance to speak of.  If he reached out he could grab any of her limbs and haul her back to the spacecraft with him.  Unused to loosing face with his men, he knew he had to bring her back to the ship; but his human side argued furiously with his kitsune side as to how to complete his intentions. 

His human side, saw only fury in the embarrassment at being ignored and having others see this.  Whilst his kitsune side screamed furiously at him to protect her, to scoop her up in his arms and carry her to the nest he had unwittingly made for her aboard the shuttle.  Both sides of himself cut short and deprived of any action as a bleep sounded from the collar.  Followed by a screech of animalistic pain and her fragile little back arching so far that it almost looked like it would snap in two.  Her eyelids fluttering, as beneath them her eyes moved in the rapid movements of someone fitting, or else being forced to unconsciousness.

Snarling General Hux reached forwards.  Ignoring every instinct of self-preservation to scoop her from the dirty floor.  Ignoring the dirt-marks the salt and soil made on his pristine uniform as he knelt in it, straightening his back and cradling her to his chest.  Turning to face the Command Shuttle and the lone figure of a smirking Kylo Ren.


	6. Chapter 6

You had woken to a hard cold metallic covered, patterned flooring, the latticed gridwork digging roughly into the meat of your thighs.  Head pounding, your mouth dry, to the point of skin splits in your lips, tasting strangely metallic.  Groaning almost inaudibly you shuffled onto your knees, squinting despite the low lighting as you shuffled around what seemed to be a small box room containing only yourself and a small amount of stark black furnishings.  It was windowless and without an apparent source of light of its own made the tiny beam of artificial light poking through the gap in the door all the more precious.

Thankfully though your kind could manage on less lighting than humans, so you relaxed your pupils.  Opening them to swallow up what little lighting there was, using both hands and scent to feel your way to a small couch.  Forgetting Kylo Ren’s threat that you belonged on the floor to take some comfort when it could be given.  Listening to the faint hums of an engine, the repetitive whirring of machinery and mixed smells of coolant and engine fire telling you that you where once more aboard a ship.  Most likely one located in outer space again.  Curling up and pulling your tail around yourself and whimpered at you missed chance to escape.  Knowing that in your panic you had played you hand too soon and wasted your escape.  You should have waited for a planet with a better chance of escape, not risked it all for nothing.  The chance would never come again, they would not allow you another glimpse of freedom.  

Your self-pity was broken by the swinging open of a door.  The metal plate oddly for one aboard a star-ship on hinges, given the luxury of space.  Suggesting that you where not just in any old room, the prowling figure that entered smirking.  His dark eyes, and possessive knowledge of his surroundings proclaiming it to be his room. 

Heart thudding you slid to the floor, only for Kylo Ren’s smirk to lengthen in an unpleasant promise of a threat.  All of your senses alight with fear, scenting more human males behind him and cowering as they came into the room with him.  Fanning out to surround you in an arch baring the door, each dressed in some variant of First Order uniform and all screaming danger to you.    

“I hope I will not have to remind you of your place again, after this.”

The last two words where spoken after a pause and with almost a nonchalant reminder of a forgotten plan.  Once that almost made you discard your choice to remain mute and demand to know what was happening.  Dropping your gaze to the floor, hunching up on yourself.  Doing anything and everything you could to appear docile and unthreatening to the large man.  Almost prostrating yourself in front of him in a voiceless show of useless atonement for your crimes.    

“I would suggest her arm Supreme Leader, or somewhere fleshy.  There is less risk of rejection that way Sir.”

It had not been Kylo Ren who spoke, but the man stood to his left.  His uniform a very pale grey and around him a scent cloud of mixed chemicals.  Anaesthetic and antibacterial soap mostly, then a faint whiff of ether and iron.  A medic then you realised, shuddering as the men above you discussed what was to happen to you.  All of it about you and none of it involving you, or for your good. 

A hum had sounded, Then Kylo Ren scooped down to look at you.  His voice dripping with icy venom and taunt as he seemingly offered you one last chance.

“I am not stupid, I know you can understand what you cannot speak.  Nod yes?”

You ignored the request to show him you where more than a stupid animal.  Counting the benefits against the losses should you play into his little trick.  Yelping when a huge hand shot forwards and grabbed your chin, snarling in what you were supposed to take in intimidation.

 

“In thanks for your little episode, you are to be fitted with an animal’s identification chip.  We would hate for you to get lost again.”

Each syllable was spat at you.  His teeth gritted together in a show of his anger, a small display of a man perhaps lacking in control here.  You were being punished with a chip where you?  It would be nothing more in mortification than the collar you wore, or their inability to provide you with respectable clothing and accommodation.  A chip was easily removed, unlike (and you had tried) the heavy ring of iron at your throat.     

Sighing Kylo Ren relinquished the hold on your chin allowing you to lower your chin.  Himself standing to readdress the room, realising he was no longer the centre of attention and spitefully offering a solution to the growing uncomfortableness from the restless men surrounding you.  Taking back control and again pretending you where nothing but a voiceless beast.    

“What about her buttock?”

The man who’s job you suspected was to perform the surgery stepped forwards.  Having taken the time during your exchange with his Supreme Leader to prepare himself and his equipment.  Wearing now a white coat and holding a large barrelled metal syringe gun. 

“Not a good idea Supreme Leader; too much muscle.”

There was another hum of thought, one that was deliberate and not at all from his indecisiveness.  It was meant to draw out your attention to the act that was being committed.  Allowing you to stare wide eyed at the large circumference of the syringe until the order was given to the room to pin you.  Four of the men swiftly moving to pin you to the floor.  Your face shoved face first in to the floor and your ass pinned up for all it had been dismissed as an injection site.  

Humming in thought the Supreme Leader’s measured footsteps walked around the you.  His brown eyes narrowing as he considered his options, another smirk gracing his features as he came to his realisation.  Voicing his choice of location with an iron weight sense of finality.   

“Her inner thigh, prepare it.”

You had expected by preparation that Kylo Ren meant to numb the injection site, but all that seemed to pass as preparation was a cold swab that left behind a thick smell of iodine.  You began trembling at that.  Knowing now that if their treatment of you was not mortifying enough; then the terror that had been no anaesthetic offered was somehow worse.  Judging from the size of the bared needle coming closer in your peripheral vision; there was no way you could be subjected to it without one.  Surely the man about to insert it would have the ethics to refuse to do so without, surely there was some humanity in the man. 

The tip of it pressed to your skin and you almost wet yourself.  Holding onto your bladder knowing that to pee would only leave you open to both more pain and infection.  Given that this man was prepared to do this; who knew anymore.  Although you had at least not yet given into your internal demands to break your silence and to verbally plead that they do not do this to you.  Another one of General Hux’s long t-shirts covered you, though not by much.  Then when someone pulled it up to expose more of you to the room, you understood for the first time the shame that humans felt in being naked.  You had not had the clothing pulled up enough to clear the injection site, no this was done to expose you.  To remind you before they hurt you how much worse they could make it.  Mind games meant to break your resolve and at least get you to beg for them to stop. 

You would not though and gritting your teeth you squeezed your eyes shut.  Then breathed out, deliberately emptying your lungs so that you could not scream against the pain that came as the needle was pushed forwards.  Not for the first time furious that General Hux was not here to somehow protect you, to do what any normal Kitsune-male would and should do.    

Instead it all proceeded, and it was slow.  Not just deliberately to hurt you, but so that it would cause least chances of rejection.  Still you felt the agonizing pain as the needle dragged though your flesh.  The pain so bad that it stole your ability to draw the breath in you wanted to take to scream at them to stop.  Panting as there was a click and then the even slower withdrawal of the needle. 

You thought back to the tagging of livestock.  Of course, there had been no anaesthetics, Kylo had insisted that you were a dumb animal.  Worse you had behaved as one.  Now as tears streaked your cheeks and the medic placed a small dressing over your implant site, the others drew back and with a dismissal from Kylo Ren; left the room.  No longer needing anyone to pin you down as you gasped for breath against the throbbing in your inner thigh.  The medic only staying long enough to program the details of your identification into a data-pad.  One which Kylo Ren placed onto the settee you had been curled up onto.  Patting your head before he with another twisted grin left you to writhe on the floor in agony; sobbing until all you could manage was hiccupped wracked breaths.

He had left you alone in what you realised shuffling slowly around was a new set of rooms, these ones a mix of carpeted rugs and wooden floors.  The furnishings still plain, though with the addition of a few pieces of what you assumed to be art on display.   Wincing as the steps you took around the place, opened up the wound site a little.  Leaving small splatters of blood on the cream coloured furnishings. 

These rooms were huge; and either belonging to General Hux or Kylo Ren.  Either one would not be pleased if you marked anymore of their belongings with your animal-blood.  Another panicked breath and you touched to the site to try and stop another trickled droplet.  Hissing at the rawness of the pain as you hurried in search of a refresher-room.

You had intended on just finding another dressing to place over the one you had been given.  First of all running cold water over a wash-cloth, then holding it against the bruise forming on your thigh.  But as you sighed against the soothing chill of the water, you reached for the controls on the shower.  Pulling the shower head low on the holder and directing it down.  A gentle trickle of water falling onto your thigh once you had slid to sit in the bottom of the basin.  Curling around yourself, shivering from the cold, but seeing it as secondary a concern to the relief it provided to your implant site.

Across the Finalizer General Hux had finished his self-designated twenty-four-hour shift.   Whilst there had been some pleasure in being back aboard his beloved Finalizer, the one place he had spent long enough on to truly call home. His long and varied debriefing to his men on the changes to leadership, had been humiliating to say the least.  He had intended on being named Supreme Leader’s successor and not the idiotic and over dramatic grandson of Darth Vader.  To have to admit to his men that they now had to take orders from him, was both a disappointment and he had convinced himself very grudgingly only a temporary setback. 

It would not make any real difference to his current position. For all of his bullying and prancing ways Kylo Ren was not a military leader; he needed General Hux.  If nothing else than to act as a translator between himself and the First Order’s military personnel.  He had no idea how to do anything other than give out a brattish demand, no real understanding of how it all worked.  It might be Kylo Ren who had made himself their new commander-in-chief.  But he was just a mystical figure head. It was he, General Hux was the true supreme leader of the First Order. 

Reaching his living quarters, he paused.  First to send an affirmative to the chosen navigator’s flight path to the new rendezvous point.  The other to frown over the redeployment of one of the ground-based animal welfare officers.  It should not have bothered General Hux usually, except that what was odd about it was the time and location of redeployment.  The man had according to the ships itinerary arrived an hour before they had made their first jump into lightspeed and the authorisation to join his crew had apparently come from General Hux himself.  Swirling on his heels he took the first turbo lift he could come to.  Programming the destination to take him to Kylo Ren’s old quarters.  Fuming and curious as to the man’s deception. 

As Supreme Leader naturally his orders theoretically superseded General Hux’s, so there had been no need to lie about the commands origins.  But having not given the command himself, Kylo Ren was logically the only man who would have the authorization and the drive to do this. 

The turbo-lift reached its destination and General Hux stormed through the opening doors.  His feet pounding into the durasteel panels beneath his boots, determined that when he got hold of Kylo Ren he would strangle him.  Consequences be damned, he was not interested in the female; but he sure as hell was not having Ren station a veterinarian aboard his ship.  It was not for her sake but his; the dig at what she was, bit too close to the bone.  It was not her who should be insulted at having a veterinarian, she was after all not human.  But he, he was, and he knew it was only a matter of time before Kylo Ren decided to make reference to it. 

Like Kylo Ren, General Hux was not without his own knowledge of short cuts and back doors around the ship’s security system.  General Hux already had the access codes to Ren’s chambers, his only surprise was finding the rooms apparently empty.  Frowning as he momentarily deliberated over whether or not he had mis-read Kylo Ren’s taunt.  Then at the sounds of running water took a seat in one of the armchairs.  Determined that he would not be found pacing the room when Ren arrived.  Choosing his seated position based on years of practiced posturing.  Back ramrod straight in alignment for all his arms appeared relaxed as he placed them on the rests either side of him.  Smirking to himself in self-given congratulations at finding Ren doing something as mundane as showering.  Flicking dirt from himself and rearranging his sleeves, ensuring he would look pristine and civilized; compared to Kylo Ren’s post showered self. 

But as time went on niggling doubt began to worry at Hux, threatening to turn into a less controlled temper.  Either Ren knew he was here and was taking the longest and quietest shower in history; or else it was not him in the shower.  He took a breath.  Pressing the balls of his feet to the floor and pressing.  Digging talon-shaped fingers into the chair arms.  Anything to stop himself from restlessly tapping against something and signalling that he was here.  Then on sleep deprived auto-pilot springing to his feet.  Resolutely deciding that he would tackle Kylo Ren sooner, rather than later; whilst he was still awake enough to do so.  But still having the will-power needed, to exercise a controlled descent on the menace; to at least appear unwaveringly calm in his planned angry tête-à-tête with the Supreme Leader. 

What he found in the refresher-room was not what he was expecting at all and taken aback it was a moment or two before he could make himself enter.  Practically kicking himself at not realizing sooner that something was terribly wrong. 

Either she was asleep, or else so distraught over something that she had not heard him enter the rooms.  Now as he came closer his footsteps became less menacing; more delicate in force.  Creeping forwards on the balls of his feet, approaching her like she was a wounded deer ready to take flight and injure herself more.  Unsure as to why she was in Ren’s quarters at all; let alone why she was curled up in the shower basin.  A steady and gentle stream of cold water trickling onto her.  Closer still it appeared his arrival had done nothing more than to elicit a whimper from her.  Something that given her eyes were firmly closed, he was not sure was in greeting or a reflex to something she dealt with whilst unconscious.

Whatever reason had driven her to lay pitifully curled up on herself and shivering it could not be good.  The sight pulling at the heartstrings that he claimed not to have as he knelt to her.  Almost wishing he had not come in as he touched her shoulder to attract her attention.  Determined that this time he really would ask her for her name, he would not feel so dastardly base at not knowing the next time he needed to grab her attention.  Removing his hand quickly as with a jolt she shuffled to face him.  Pulling her knees up and as far from him as she could possibly manage in the small space.  Almost crawling up the walls in an attempt to escape him.  Eyes wide and breath coming in ragged spurts as she locked her vision on her perceived threat.  The unmistakeable signs of a trauma victim.  Making General Hux snarl, using every ounce of restraint he had to quietly demand to know what Ren had done to her.

He hardly wanted to scare her anymore than she already had been.  But there was something about the way in which she held her legs that worried him.  Almost as though it was too painful to close them, whilst she also wanted to shield that part of herself that was most private from him.  Making a dread cold unfold in the pit of his stomach and his jaw clamp shut against the sickening wave of nausea.  If Ren had touched her, if he had.

“I didn’t speak, I didn’t let on I can.”

She looked almost feverish in her desire to let him know she had not told Ren anything.  Shaming him further for the treatment they allowed of her.  Given what he had done to her, she owed him no loyalties; yet she was almost puppyish in her whispered search for his approval.  He would have groaned aloud at his own incompetence and neglect of her, had he not feared that she would take it as another slight against herself.  Instead he nodded, untrusting of knowing the right thing to say to bring her comfort.  Trying to remember what it had been like for a small frightened boy suffering the bullying treatment of his father.  Deciding he disliked those thoughts more so than facing the guilt that was figuratively and literally laid at his feet right now.


	7. Chapter 7

“What did they do to you?”

His voice too was a whisper, only just catching onto the worry that Ren could have set this up as a trap.  Then brushing it aside as he realised that there was no likely way Ren would have his room in anyway under surveillance for fear that it was likely that General Hux himself could intercept any images.  Kylo Ren may be an idiot, but he was a smart idiot. 

Her only answer was to part her legs to show him.  The movement slow and shaky, her face breaking into an open wince from the movement.  A small whine huffing past her parted lips, as the air hit the wet bandage slapped over her inner thigh.  Her delicate little fingers slowly reaching to pick at it, pulling one corner of it back from chill reddened skin.  Her teeth clamped shut in a snarl of delicate canines and incisors that was meant to show bravery as she revealed bruising and swollen flesh around a puncture site.  His longer but no less slender fingers moving swiftly, perhaps too much so as she dropped it and sunk back.  His wrapping her wrist to stop her now from fleeing his attempts to put right so much wrong, rather than to stop her from hurting herself anymore.  Deciding that this was enough for now at least.  She needed to be out of this set of rooms more than he needed to know what they had done.  Unsure if it was the animal part of him that wanted to carry her far away from here and wall her up in a place of safety, or if it was perhaps a lax show of his humanity.   

“Can you walk?”

He would apologise later, for now he wanted her to know that he was taking her away.  Promising himself that somehow, he would do better now.  Clearly, he could not have her removed from the ship.  But he could do plenty to make her feel safer.  He could at least appear to comply with the instructions given for her.  He could explain better to her; he could actually treat her like a person for one.     

Her stoic answer was to show willingness by scrambling ready to her feet.  Limping a little and holding her bandaged thigh slack as she reached palm down on unsteady legs to grasp his forearms.  Her slight frame shivering as she accepted the help she was given, looking down to step over the ledge of the shower basin.  Then to slowly make her way across the floor with him.  Following his lead for as he could bare the slow pace.  Whilst he ignored the restless feeling to bolt.  He wanted both of them out of here, like yesterday.  He wanted out of everything that reminded him of what Kylo Ren was capable of and she needed proper medical care.  In a flash of decisive decision making he turned to her.  Stepping forwards, sighing a little as in automatic defence she drew back a little.  Needing a little more time to convince the adrenaline coursing her body to accept his proximity to her.  He needed her to neither fight him, nor fly from him.  He needed her to trust him.       

“We are pressed for time, put your arms around my neck.”                             

Of course, she did exactly what he had ordered her to.  Though it was a stiff and uncomfortable face that met his, when he turned his chin to her and dipped to put one arm under her knees.  The other at her back and pulling her towards him as he straightened to stand.  Longer more deliberate strides carrying her back to the turbo lift he had used to arrive here.  The relief of reaching his chosen location, giving way back into guilt as her undershirt she wore rode up her back a little.  Reminding him of the initial though he had had upon finding her; just because she was more concerned with her injury did not mean that nothing else had happened.    

“Did Ren touch you anywhere?”

You shook your head, to his question, almost but not quite daring to take your eyes off him as you pressed against his shoulder.  Shocked at the implication from the tone of questioning.  That General Hux cared if he had touched, you rather than the question he had put to you. 

You took a small breath, though it almost came out as a gasp for air.  Whilst Kylo Ren had touched your face, you doubted that counted as anywhere General Hux meant.  You had seen that possessive look before in other mated Kitsunes, who felt challenged for their mates.  Shuddering at the though of both being wanted in such a way; and the dread of someone like General Hux being forced to be your mate.  It had taken until now for him to show an inkling of the protectiveness that was needed for the companionship that would provide for youngling kitsunes.  Even then you doubted it was less about you being the possible mother of his kits and more his constant show down with Kylo Ren.      

There was no further conversation on the matter as you reached a black and chrome door.  No suggestion that this was a good or a bad thing, except a tightening on the grip General Hux had on you.  That and a refusal to let go of you until he had sat you on a stone polished surface.  The marbled pattern of it flecked with silver swirls and smoothed dimples, that you followed with your fingertips.  Your eyes instead following him.  Legs parted to avoid rubbing on one another, as you watched him switch on a chrome tap and bustle busily about the room.  Adjusting lighting and moving items from a large copper coloured, but low heighted table in the centre.  Wiping it over with a sharp smelling spray, before darting briefly into another room to retrieve a small array of packages.  Setting them aside on his return and coming back to you.  Reaching for you with both his hands.

Everything in you wanted to go to him.  Your heart flipping heavily in your chest to this different man; but you were not without common sense.  Whilst you had smelt the danger on Kylo Ren; you had never expected this to happen so brutally.  How could you possibly be sure that you could trust General Hux now to be acting in kindness?

“I want to look and see what they have done, to see if there is any way I can make it better.”

You had to accept that his voice sounded genuine.  Low and gentle, it still held notes of an authoritative man, one who was sure and sincere in his attempts.  You wanted to follow it too, but as he had offered to make it better, you had seen red.  Not the warning signs of danger, but a reckoning on your foolish actions. 

“I can tell you exactly what they have done to me General.  The have collared and tagged me like a bloody animal.”

Your words had found themselves before you had realised what you had said and somewhere distant in your mind you listened as you continued in the shrill angry tone.  Not quite a snarl or a shout, but the tone unmissable as challenge to his authority here.  Continuing despite the warning scowl on the ginger’s pale and freckle dusted face.

“And now it seems you all want to cage me and breed me like some prized cosset.  So pray tell me General Hux, how are you going to make that better; are you going to free me?”

A noise like a barked growl almost sprung from General Hux’s throat at her challenge.  Caught in time before it could give way to one of his precise little come backs.  Shocked as she drew back on herself.  Frowning as he took a breath of air that even to him tasted faintly different.  The scent faint, but concentrated strongest around her. 

So long as he approached slowly, she let him come closer.  Following him with wide hazel eyes that seemed to register what it was far quicker than he had.  A look of dread and shame washing over her cheeks.  Leaving them painted white with red spots high on her cheeks.  He wanted to ask her what it was.  But it would have shown his ignorance too clearly for his liking and ignorance would show a weakness.  She already had him an obvious disadvantage, he did not need to hand her any more.        

His nose was almost buried in her neck before frowned and pulled breath in to speak again.  This time there was another edge to her voice.  This one much less defiant, more pitying.  Another emotion that he swore was redundant to him.

“You really don’t know much about your own kind, do you?”

The suggestion that he was lacking intelligence on a species that was only a half of his made up genetics broke him from his trance and straightening up he pulled his face back into it neutral frown. Straightening his shoulders and pretending that she had not spoken.  Using the small space of her misguided compassion to pull her as gently as his temper could manage to her feet and have her follow him to the table. 

He had intended the first time he had approached to offer to carry her.  But there was something inside of him that pettily held out against that chivalrous act.  The man his father had beaten into the small innocent boy he had once been reminding him of his naivety back then.  Only the strongest truly deserved to survive in this new order and she could walk damn it.  He was a soldier, not a nurse he told himself as he gruffly ordered her to lay down.  This caring for her now was in itself was a kindness that he did not have to bestow on her.  It would not kill her to have this done.

“What are you going to do?”

Her temper seemed to have ebbed to nothing.  Leaving behind her fear again as she complied and lay back onto the copper table, propping herself up on her elbows and forearms.  Not quite trusting him yet, he guessed from the tremble that for all her resolve still slipped through her voice as he loaded up a syringe with a clear almost yellow tinted liquid.  Then another with several other chemical compounds. 

“I can’t take it out, he would just find you and put it back in again.  But I can make it more comfortable for you.”

She nodded.  Her eyes still wide as he crouched to his knees and refused to look up past the half-removed dressing.  He knew that the hem of her t-shirt sat just below her sex.  The apex of her thighs hidden from him for all the gentleman in him screamed not to look.  Just a small space of shadows that as she lay down and allowed him to manipulate her leg to the side.   Trying not to expose her anymore as he bent her knee and in one fast movement pulled off the tape holding her dressing in place.  Reaching for her as she gave a tiny yelp of pain, before giving into sobs and curling her leg back around.  Sitting up and grabbing his hands to push them away. 

“Don’t, please don’t; General no!”

He had the syringe in one hand and struggled to keep it from pricking her hands.  Choosing to let her push them away from him in an attempt to stop her panic.  Understanding dawning on him that she had not realized how close to the wound he would have to inject.

“I have to.”

She shook her head in refusal making him draw in a heavy breath.  Letting it out in a show of annoyance at having to deal with this.  He had faced worse at his father’s hands, but then at a quiet plea not to hurt her anymore, he once more knew shame at his treatment of her.  He had promised he would know her name and yet he had no idea of what to call her as he gently put aside the syringe.  This time asking for it, dipping his chin once as she gave him it and repeating it slowly.

“My name is Armitage, you don’t have to call me General or Hux.  But what is in that needle needs to go in.”

You knew that technically he was right.  The site was already more heated than it should have been, and there was the rhymical throb that suggested more swelling.  But you couldn’t bring yourself to accept that just yet.  It already hurt enough and all your wriggling about seemed to have aggravated it more.  Instead you asked the foolish question.

“Will it hurt?”

His lids lowered, staying closed for a resting beat of your swollen leg, before they opened again.  His tongue running the line of his lips.    

“If I could I would numb the site first.  But its already too aggravated for anything I have to work.  I need to hurt you, but only to make it better.  I promise you will only feel the first prick.”

You could practically taste the regret in his voice, almost making you wonder if this was a trap.  If the plan was to just hurt you some more.  But then he pulled up each small glass vial.  Explaining what the mix of drugs would do.  Stroking at your ankle as he tried to gently convince you to let him do this to you.  Then as you nodded and parted your leg he reached for the smaller needle.   

“This one is purely to numb the site, it might burn a little at first.”

He seemed to wait for another show of your permission to continue.  This time there was no suggestion that you should lay down.  Instead as you jumped at the first press of the lanced blade tip to your skin, he moved faster.  His hand no longer at your ankle and now gripping the join of your leg to your groin.  His face a feral mix of determination and strength as you screamed under him and instinct gave in.  Making you try to fight him off, he was right it did hurt.  Almost unbearably so as he released a small amount of the liquid under your already too taught skin.  The liquid burning as it spread out into the no existent space offered it.  His grip surprisingly stronger than you had expected as you reached forwards and bit the back of his shoulder blade.  His hand finally letting go of its grip on your leg to reach for your head. 

General Hux had the intelligence to withdraw the needle and re-inject it in a space close to the first one.  Instead of pulling you off him, leaning into your bite.  Gripping your hair tighter and pushing your face into his shoulder in an attempt to cut your air off if you didn’t let go. 

“For someone who takes offense at being treated like an animal, you sure know how to act like one.”

It was a throw away comment.  One that decided that you probably deserved as you let go of his shoulder.  Grimacing as he now reached to rub at the damp teeth marked back of his uniform.

“And I thought we were past the biting stage.”

This time you realised that he was trying to make light of the situation and not to belittle you.  He didn’t smile, but his eyes showed a little amusement as you leaned back to run your fingers over the now colourless bit of skin. Ashamed to admit that he was right, it had only hurt for two passes of the needle, and then only on the second one because he had injected quicker than he had intended on doing. 

“Has it numbed?”

Again you just nodded.  So used to not speaking around him that you had to think to do so now.  Coughing to free up your vocal chords as you gave a little yes.  Determined despite it being a joke that you would not be giving him any more excuses to call you an animal for today. 

The second injection obviously did not hurt, though you still had to watch him do it.  His actions followed by an instruction to stay where you were.  Almost crossing your legs as you rocked your bottom to free your tail from its uncomfortable position and walk your legs around the table until you faced him.  Watching him fill up a bowl of water and bring it back to you.  Using swabs to clean the much less swollen looking puncture wound before reaching for a dressing.  Opening it; but setting it aside and reaching for thin white strips.  Two of which he placed over the opening in your flesh before placing the opened dressing atop of it and proclaiming you done.  Standing straight before reaching to ruffle the top of your hair in an odd show of affection at a job well done. 

General Hux himself was shocked at his willingness to touch the girl.  Taken aback at how easily the decision was made and done; he usually shied from humanoid touch.  It had been the reason for getting Millicent.  Something that needed him, that was tactile to his needs for contact; but also far enough removed from him to permit him to care for her.  Now as he drew back from the Kitsune he narrowed his eyes in thought.  Turning quickly from copper tipped lashes before he could delve anymore into thoughts on his beloved Millicent.  His anger towards Ren less acute as it was earlier that evening, but still settled on heated coals.  His temper ready to ignite to flames when it was time to confront Ren. 

For now he loosened his tunic and removed his gloves.  Setting the tap to boiling and shoving a small amount of brown and green mixed herbs from one particular canister into a small teapot.  Pulling down a small metal mug and adding a spoonful of honey ready in the beaker.  Pouring water over the herbs and letting them seep whilst he took himself over to the liquor cabinet he kept over near her and placed a single cube of ice in an expensive glass tumbler.   The poured atop of it a drink of the amber brown rum, sniffing it as it swirled in his glass. Almost breaking a grin as he looked over to the female sat crossed legged still atop of the table.  Walking back to pour a measure of the liquid out before taking a seat on the sofa opposite and placing the beaker of tea before her.  Leaning back and taking a sip of his drink before prompting her to drink. 

“What is it?”

Her fingers flicked towards the silver coloured container of tea.  Her face devoid of suspicion, but her voice less so. 

“Its tea.  Its good for you drink it.”

You scowled at the tea.  It smelt suspiciously like the foul stuff he made you drink aboard the first ship he had kept you on.  A sip only confirming that it was.  The honey doing precious little to make it palatable, you set it aside. 

“I don’t like it.”

“Drink it.”

It was not so much like you were telling him that you disliked it as much as you wanted not to drink it.  Pettily debating throwing it, despite the cold look he gave you as he lent forwards and picked it up.  Holding the small beaker of tea between his thumb and forefinger as he held it out to you.  Sighing when you took it from him; but didn’t drink as ordered.  Downing his glass and then rubbing his face as he stood.  Returning with another and a spare.  Sitting once more and placing what was meant to be you glass next to you.  His fingers catching on your tail where it lay curled under you, almost stroking it as he removed his fingers.  Remaining perched on the edge of his chair this time and looking closely at you.

“Look, you had been given no suppressants.  We both know its only a matter of time before you go into heat; and when you do we will both be grateful for what is in that tea.”                   


	8. Chapter 8

The tea tasted as foul as always.  But as you had done yesterday and the day before, you choked it down.  Finding it tasted less foul when it was still hot enough to numb the taste buds on the surface of your tongue.  Now that you understood what it was, it was made for you three times a day personally by General Hux.  Each dose handed to you, whilst he presided over you swallowing it like some bossy matriarchal mother hen.

The honey that he had tried adding to sweeten the tincture you drank down on your first dose aboard the Finalizer, if anything made it worse.  The usually pleasant ingredient giving it too much of a synthetic burnt sugar-like taste.  The saccharine sweetness mixed with the bitter smoky herbs badly.  Making you want to vomit it straight back up if you drank it too quickly; but still leaving you with a queasy complaining stomach if you sipped it.  Instead General Hux just spread the dose out.  Despite your protests that you could make and remember to drink it, braking off from his work.  Returning like clockwork to brew it and then waiting until you had finished it all. 

Now he took the empty beaker from you.  Checking it had really gone, whilst his spare hand reached into the pocket of his long Gaber-wool outercoat as he approached the sink.  A click sounded as the beaker was placed against the metal of the empty sink besides you.  General Hux returning his attention back to you.  His greatcoat left open and flapping as he turned to you for the bit of this daily ritual, that was at least palatable. 

You expected given past behaviour, for him now to hand over to you a lump of cheese or some sort of meat in reward for your compliance.  One that like some little pet you would gladly take from him and nibble on to clear the taste from your palette.  Instead this time, he was holding out a smallish neon yellow and bright pink object.  Completely spherical and dusted with what smelt like powdered sugar pinched loosely between his thumb and fore finger as he presented it to you.  It looked all the more brighter as he held it out to you for being held in his black leather robed fingertips.  His voice still silent as expectantly he hovered, waiting for you to take it from him; whilst you just stared at it.    

You knew that he was waiting for you to eat it or at least thank him for it.  But honestly you had no idea how to; you just needed to know what it was.  His perfectly shaped ginger brows raising when you did not immediately reach to take it from him.  Not in question of your actions, but in the realisation that you did not quite know what to do with it.  Almost there was a smile, as he brought closer to your mouth.  His eyes shifting from their previous cold blue-grey of authority to a warmer green lighted amusement.            

“It’s a sort of candy.  You suck it, but it should work to clear the taste from your mouth quickly.”

You should have reached forward with your own fingers to take it from his outstretched arm.  To have placed it into your mouth with your own fingers.  But somehow as he took the last step closer, to bring himself well past the boundaries of your personal space, it appeared to brush you bottom lip and you found your mouth opening to take it.   The candy placed on top of your tongue and General Hux still coming closer; this step too close.  His blue-green eyes locked with your amber ones as you closed your mouth.  His chest close enough that you could sent him under the synthetic human smells of soap, shaving cream and cologne.  He seemed not to think to relinquish the candy until your lips closed over his finger and thumb.  Your lips almost closing over his fingers as he removed the. 

Blinking he moved back from you and as you swallowed, slowly a pleasantly sweet taste began to replace that of warmed leather.  His withdrawal giving you more space.  General Hux giving his head a little shake as he turned to leave you.  Not even bidding you a polite farewell until your evening dose.  Almost as though he moved away in a refusal to admit his actions or at the very least to dispel what had just happened.  The door sliding behind himself as he left, a whirr as the locks clicked into place.  It was probably done more to keep others out, than to keep you in these days; though you never thought to ask.  Whilst you wanted space to run, you wanted it aboard the dirt of a planet; not a sterile ship. 

Alone your lips still tingled, and you could swear you could still feel his fingers against them.  Sitting down on the couch, you brought your fingers to your mouth to rub away the phantom sensation.  Biting hard on the sweet, crunching until it was ground to tiny particles under your teeth.  Your heart racing and head still dizzy from having him so close.  Almost sobbing at the unfairness of it all; of what this captivity was going to cost you.   You were close to your heat, a day or two a best.  Everything about you that was not human was shifting.  Signalling the small changes that left uncontrolled, would signal to those in proximity that you were almost ready. 

You had spent years and year keeping under control.  Having been around your own kind since birth you had had the education General Hux had not.  Others had swiftly shown you what to look for when your body changed into adulthood, whilst also giving you suppressants from an early age.  All done to leave you in control and to protect you from exploitation from others.  To give you a choice and a chance to take what you wanted when you felt ready.  Not all clans did it, but most did.  It was done with to free both sexes and naturally assigned roles, from submitting when nature dictated and General Hux like the naïve ignorant idiot he was, truly had no idea.  Not of what this was going to cost either of you, or anything of how this was going to work once it triggered the changes in him.

You had first realised it when he had subconsciously registered the changes to your scent.  The growl he had given, when you (apparently in this paring) an omega female kitsune, had yelled at him.  Then his reactions when he had followed the beginnings of a change of your scent to the gland at you neck.  He acted since then in an almost sense of curious arousal around you.  Subtle little shows that his body knew what was happening, if had been obvious that his mind had not realized what was happening to you.  Another more experienced male, would have been either running to put distance between you; or else if interested hounding you.  Repeatedly seeing off other challengers whilst trying to offer little touches.  All meant to hurry you along; or at least to ensure he was there when the animal side of you took over.  Bringing gifts to make you receptive to him, whilst helping to prepare your body for the extra expended energy that your heat would take from you.

But you did; and so sighing, you stood again.  There was not much in his cupboards, mostly drinks.  Plenty of tea, both your kind and the even more unpleasant Tarine tea he seemed to favour.  No wonder he had not understood why you found yours so unpleasant, if he drank that bitter beverage.  Still there were a few items of food.  Protein bars mostly and fruit.  You took a bar and a soft yellow fruit, eating them and then cleared the rubbish into a garbage chute.  Of course, he sent meals.  But there had been no order for you not to touch his foods and you needed to store up calories for later.  Just as taking the extra rest was a good plan.  It was not like he left you with anything to do.

You were still asleep when Hux returned.  The smells of cooked meats waking you up, rather than the sounds of him moving about his chambers.  Bleary eyes and your body still lax from sleep when he placed a plate on the copper table in front of the couch you had fallen asleep on.  You sat up, adjusting the blanket he must had placed in you on his arrival, accepting the utensils he handed out to you.     

“You know to nap in your cage, what if Ren had broken in?”

His voice was harder than he had intended it to be in his rebuke, feeling slightly guilty when she slid to the plush red rug.  Her knees sinking into the dyed bantha-wool, spearing a small piece of meat and sniffing it before brining it to her mouth.  He knew she was hungry, he had noticed the missing fruit and made a mental note to add more food to the meals he normally fetched her.  Groaning internally at the mess he was making of all of this.  She was supposed to be a dumb animal, he was not supposed to be growing in anyway attached to her; any part of her.  But as she delicately chewed he chased the thoughts on what he could better do with her mouth with a large gulp of spirits.  Beginning to accept that his father might have been onto something, when he had picked out his mother.  Grinning at the irony of it all; there was some sort of perverted justice in knowing that his father had been unable to reproduce with his own species.  That he had taken him from a half wild mother and had him altered.  Both surgically treated and beaten until he could present his offspring as a reflection of his entirely human self.  Presenting him to his human wife and not even telling her of his origins.  All these years he had passed as human and now here was she come to taunt him.  To ask him to add more deception, whilst being the most honest with his needs for the first time since he had been an infant.    

It had been decided by General Hux, that she was best playing the dumb animal which miraculously Ren seemed to think she still was; and he had checked.  First when Ren had handed over the details on her chip over to General Hux the morning after he had done it, leaving just a space for her name.  Practically smirking when he introduced him to the man who had done it to her, a taunting lilt to his voice as he asked if the man could be of anymore assistance to her welfare.  It had been hard to keep the snarl from his voice as he almost yelled no.  Glad that he was known for his death-like sneer, mentally counting the ways to dismember the man who had hurt her.  Kylo Ren had not been as unperceptive as the veterinarian had been.  Hux swiftly filled in a name for her.  Not her actual one, that would have been too cruel a taunt and let on that she could communicate with him.  Practically throwing the device back before demanding a handover of the ships that had arrived in the night. Gritting his teeth against the questions that were barraged at him from his Supreme Leader about when she would be ready.

“I don’t know Ren, do you think if I could I would have asked her by now.”

It was not a lie and perhaps for the honesty it had been enough to fool the force user.  Either way he had kept his secret desires from one Supreme Leader; and this one should be easier to misdirect.  His role as General of the First Order taking him gladly from Kylo Ren’s side.  He couldn’t ask her what was going to happen.  Not because she wouldn’t answer, but because he couldn’t face up to the fear of what he was going to become.  He had read up on what to expect, that she would be more than willing and that he by that same force of nature would be very accommodating to her needs.  Other than that, the details were vague and always based from an entirely human experience.  There were no hints as to how he as a male of her species would react, it seemed they were considered less desirable to the human slavers who hunted Kitsunes. 

A scrape and he looked back over at her placing the finished cutlery in the sink, looking over to him for approval as she waited near the brewing pot.  Sighing and joining her there to pour out the measure into a handless teacup.  Watching over her until it was all gone and then rinsing the cup, this time handing her his glass to take a sip whilst he dealt with the contents of the teapot.  Gesturing to her to keep it as he returned to pour himself a fresh one and produced another piece of boiled candy.  Wincing as he listened to the sounds of her crunching it whilst he prepared himself for bed, instructing her to do the same once he had finished in the shower.  Pouring another glass and picking up a data pad to continue working whilst she took what seemed to be a lengthy shower.  Appearing from it dressed in more of his clothing, her hair damp and tousled to messy waves from her attempts at towel drying it.  Her tail wrapping tighter to herself when she noticed him staring, ears flattening.  She was unsure he realised, something was off with her.   

She had changed into another one of his undershirts for bed.  This one less heavy than the short sleeved one she had worn during the day.  It was more vest-like and totally sleeveless.  Grey with a lower neckline that perhaps as he looked at her cleavage was the wrong one to have chosen.  He was much taller than her, so it hung loose.  One shoulder slipping down and sitting.  The hem high up on her thighs, covering her like a very short but shapeless dress.  It would have to do though.  Since Ren’s assertion that she was just an animal, he had not dared to request clothing for her.  It was essential for Ren to assume she was just some pet-like creature.  If he knew she had a higher intelligence, then he would find a way to exploit it.

“We should sleep.”

The suggestion that they both retire to bed came out much gruffer, but much less like a command than he would have liked.  Hurrying to finish his glass of rum and past her.  Ignoring the dark of her pupils and the way she seemed to weakly shudder as he brushed past her.  Swallowing hard, at the thin veil of her scent he needed to walk through to get to the bedroom. 

His less human senses where sharpening the longer he was around her.  Already he was becoming more attuned to the differences in her scent when her mood changed.  He assumed he too must give out similar pheromones, but he wondered if his were as attractive to her as hers were becoming to him.  Today especially he found himself thinking more unnatural thoughts than usual as to what he could do to her.  Remembering too quickly what he had seen when she had laid naked on the medical examination table and that his shirt was all that hid that from him.  He knew she rarely wore underwear, even though he had made it clear enough that his were available to him should she require them.  It was her tail he supposed, it must make them difficult to put on.  Still as he turned down his comforter and she began bending to the cage, General Hux wished she would.  It seemed he could smell that very feminine part of her strongest of all scents in the room.

“Do you think you can manage not to wake me tonight?”

General Hux was climbing into his bed as he spoke, and you into yours.  His, a large bed, pristinely made with no creases that were not deliberate and pulled tight where it was tucked in.  Such a contrast from the nest of pillows and blankets you had made in the newly acquired cage.  The only space in this sleekly designed set of rooms filled with hard lines and cold chrome surfaces that seemed to dominate his rooms that he allowed to be yours.  Him gritting his teeth against the disorder that you created in the smallest of spaces, whilst you did your best not to grin at his inability to tolerate any sort of mess.    

He was referring to the part of the night that seemed to follow since Kylo Ren’s attack.  The bit where you woke from some sort of nightmare and lay still.  Whimpering in the darkness and breathing slow breaths whilst you ran your fingers down the latticed cage work to remind yourself that you were not in Kylo Ren’s rooms anymore.  His comment caught you by surprise, you had though that pretending the next day that it had not had happened, meant that General Hux had not heard it.  Or at the very least that he was happiest not to mention it, that he had overheard what was happening.  To hear him speak of it as though it was an inconvenience to him just made your stomach tie tighter in knots as you pulled cloth coverings around you like armour.  Barricading yourself from him and the outside world.  Pleased that it would dark enough once the lights were out to pretend you were anywhere else than aboard this ship and trapped in this room with a man who confused you more than anything else.

Across the room General Hux sighed and ordered the lights off.  He had not intended for her to bare the brunt of his annoyance at the situation.  He was as trapped with her, as she was with him.  He may as well make it as pleasant as he could; for both of theirs sakes.  Still pride would not let him apologise.  Even when added to all the guilt he felt at insisting to the rest of the ship, that she was a voices pet.  Years of military discipline making it thankfully easy to shut out his thoughts in replacement for a scant handful of hours of sleep.                    

 


	9. Chapter 9

General Hux had woken to a racing heart, scrambling to claw his way from the covers and sit up straight in his bed.  Surprised to find he had for the first time in years appeared to have been dreaming.  This time of a small boy.  Messy ginger haired, he stood whilst adults moved about him, them in the white lab coats of medical professionals and him dressed in a surgical gown.  Barefooted as he was prepped for what an adult would know was for surgery.  A small busy tail peeking through the back of the opening and atop his head a small set of busy haired, black tipped fur ears. 

Then the dream had changed, morphing into a sickening nightmare of drug induced sedation until finally the tears the boy had shed on waking in pain.  Stumbling unsteadily from the medicentre bed, woozy from the medication and off balance from the loss of a tail.   

Rubbing at his face, he reached for the chronometer he kept by his bedside.  Disorientated and awoken well before his set alarm.  He lay panting quietly on his back, waiting until his breathing had calmed before he would allow himself to remember.  To attempt to remove himself from the emotion of the memory.  An actual tear sliding from one eye as he recalled how betrayed he had felt on waking.  How could he have forgotten that day of all days.  His father had told him nothing of why he was taken to the outer-rim planet; or explained their visit to the backwater medicenter.  Simply handing him over to the team and leaving them.  Returning the next day with a set of the academy cadet uniforms.  Spending the morning explaining his plans, before he had dumped him in another strange building.

It had been a common enough dream when he was younger.  A small boy who had woken traumatized from surgery to find that the image in the mirror no longer matched the one in his mind.  It had been a foolish regret, one that the man in him had pushed aside when he had over taken the boy at puberty.  It was one of the few good things to come from his bullying father.  His animal side hidden from the First Order, he had been allowed to progress up the ranks.  It had helped to make him into the man he was today.   It was a blessing really, he just had been too little to understand.

Across the room he could make out the darker shade of the cage, the girl asleep in it too seemed to be experiencing less than pleasant dreams.  He small whimpers and moans splitting the calmness that should have been the space between them.  She was having another nightmare, something that General Hux had noticed that she had not done before her last encounter with Ren.  It had become a pattern, so it seemed.  A nightly for her to lay twitching and making small noises until she woke herself up; him too.  Then he would pretend to still be asleep, whilst ignoring the part of him that wanted to run to her side and snarl at the unseen threat. 

He almost did.  Turning to his side and pulling the covers back over him.  Pulling them up and over his head, trying to block out the noise.  Shocked at himself when with a spring he shot up from the bed. Not caring for noise; or stopping yet to order the lights on.  Rushing to the opening of the cage and climbing into it with her.  Crawling over her body until he was able to stoke her hair, scratching at her ears and patting her head in what he hoped classed as a soothing action.  Meant to calm or to wake her up from whatever troubled her.

She was deep into her nightmare, and it seemed his gentler methods to help soothe her from it where not working. Her breathing becoming if anything more ragged and her legs beginning to kick out.  Either she was dreaming she was running, or else trying to get something off her.  Momentarily General Hux considered it to be him and deciding that he had only further antagonized her nightmare, he began deftly crawling from the cage.  Almost to the door before she let out a louder squeal, almost a small scream.  Making him crawl swiftly back to her. This time not at all gently reaching her as she whimpered out a small plea to stop and not to hurt her.

He didn’t care, he wanted her awake and he wanted her out of there.  It was not the first time he had heard her utter the small sentence, and he felt no less guilty on hearing it a second time.  Even knowing that he had never raised a hand to her, he still felt complicit in her suffering.  He couldn’t save her, but he could be kinder; after all he was not an animal.

“It’s just a dream.”

You had woken up shaky and disorientated, your nostrils full of the scent of alpha male as you reached forwards in the darkness.  A hand pressed at your chest stopping you from sitting too far up.  Maker he was close, too close; and yet not close enough.  Your mouth beginning to water as you took in the smell of his gland, surprised that the man had not tried to remove that too.  The one thing that let you know that he really was not human. 

“I can’t see.”

That was a lie, you could see, but you needed something to make him back off; or at least change the direction of where this could be going.  There was enough reflected starlight as you hovered in space for your eyes, to at least make out the changes in the rooms shading of shadows as he moved a little back.  Your superior sense of smell helping to map out exactly what everything was, and exactly where he was as he crawled away to the cage entrance.  Apparently waiting there, crouched low with his face to you. 

He gave a clipped order and the room was lit with a dull gloom.  Still too bright for your dilated pupils, your eyes blinking closed against the change in lighting as stiffly he explained why he was here.

“You had a dream, a nightmare I believe, I just wanted to wake you.”

He had offered up a paper-thin excuse.  Had he only wanted to wake you he could have done so without opening your cage.  Now there was another edge to his presence, on that made the tingling between your legs stronger.  He had not moved from hovering in the door way.  His eyes glued onto yours, just staring at you as you brought your knees tighter to yourself, waiting for him to decide on what he wanted of you.  No suggestion of whether you were supposed to thank him and return to sleep or if he wanted something else; something that you were not sure even now your body would reject.  You where in the early stages of your heat, not yet the desperate whining mess that would soon take over; but at the part where everything tingled.  Your skin almost too sensitive for the scant amount of clothing you had picked to wear to bed.  He knew you were becoming more receptive, perhaps he did not fully comprehend it; but his body understood.  Now as you returned his gaze your body returned its own thoughts.  He had after all warned you in not so many words, that you would be used for the purpose you had been gifted to him for.  That you had deliberately not been given suppressants.

It had been something that both of you claimed not to want.  Never in a truly cruel fashion, but always clinically accurate.  Now as you looked over him, you began to consider the weight of that.  He had as your hormones had altered, gone from indifference to an oddly caring nature.  His behaviour of you pre-heat not at all what you had been expecting from a male whom previously you would have thought would be less considerate.  Now he intrigued you to the point where you had begun to wonder how it would be, not convinced the pairing was going to be as clear cut as he was.

“I need to use the refresher.”

This time it was not a lie, though heavens knew that you wanted it to be.  Too nervous to stand and make your way there whilst he still loitered.       

It was after a while, that General Hux sighed and rubbed his weary face.  Pulling himself into a neutral standing position and stepping back to give her permission to leave the cage.  Leaving her room to access his refresher.  Her chin dipping low as she passed tantalizingly close to him, her cheeks burning as his similar did so at the guilt.

This was practically rape, and he was not sure how he felt about that.  An order was an order, but he shouldn’t want this; or even desire her. What was being done to the pair of them was almost barbarically malicious in its conscripting and could not have been without reasoning.  Now it seemed that Kylo Ren was determined to use the last order the Supreme Leader had given for her, to humiliate the General.  Everything that was done to her was an attempt to irritate General Hux as much as a warning; he behaved, or she would suffer the consequences.  General Hux should not have let her run, Ren wanted her on a tight leash.  

When she had just been and intelligent voiceless animal, that had been so much easier to handle.  Now seeing how human she was in her defencelessness he could not help but feel shame on behalf of the First Order actions to her.  He had done vicious things during both his cadet years, then later in actual service to the First Order; but it had never been personal not like this.

The flush sounded and General Hux quickly shuffled back from the door.  Aware that he should have moved away, given her more space for privacy.  Sitting on the near side of the bed, patting the side as she emerged looking hesitant and more than slightly fever-flushed.  Not just her cheeks, her eyes too carried a lively light to them, making him swallow as she stared.  The dusky pink that dusted her cheeks spreading across her nose and ears.  Deepening to a definite red and warming her neck and shoulders as it spread.  

“Sit down, we need to talk.”

His voice was low, wearied and you could guess at what he wished to talk about.  Was the middle of the night really the best time to be having this conversation. you thought not.  Almost tempted to refuse to discuss the growing issue with him, until you remembered despite your shame and anger this involved you too.  You wanted to stay back and keep your distance from the increasingly enticing smell.  But then your feet seemed to move dangerously closer until you were perched on the edge of his bed.  One leg innocently tucked under the other as you faced him.  

“You know that this is something I have no control over; that if I could none of this would be happening.”

His hand moved to indicate first you and then him.  Then at a flick the collar at your neck, the room around you and then touched his index finger to the raised spot on your inner thigh.

“Especially not this.”

His voice had grown humbler, but still it held notes of controlled authority and disgust.  Despite everything he still saw you as an animal; or at least too alien to him.  Clearly he was sorry you had been hurt by his organisation, but he was not about to let it affect his role.  It seemed very much that it was duty before honour here and in acceptance of something you had not truly understood you pushed aside you lower your chin.  Bringing your knees up to your chest and laying your chin atop of them.  Your tail wrapping to cover your chilled feet, your fox ears flat to your head.  Not to hide them, but in an honest show of sorrow at what was expected of you.  Listening as he laid out the terms as one would a shopping list, or as a to do list.  Not exactly cold, that would suggest some emotional tie to the coming act; but clinical and clear cut in his expectations of you.

“So as I understand it your body will change, both of us will become more receptive to one another.  You more so than I and then once we have experienced coitus, it should calm you down.”

It was given as a statement, and whilst wholly correct in one sense; it was also inherently wrong in his ignorance.  Making you sigh, your hormones making it easier to slip into indignant anger at his chosen naivety.  Scrambling to perch on your knees and raise yourself to be of an equal height, a gentle firmness to your voice for all you wanted to shake him and shout.  Why was he being like this, why was such a seemingly intelligent man not able to understand he too was already experiencing the subtler beginnings of a rut.

“No General.  I am already experiencing my heat as you put it, as your body is fully aware of if you would just listen to it.  And no once is not likely to be enough, this could in theory, as unlikely as it is to happen last a week!”

You lost it towards the end.  Angry tears prickling your eyes and threatening to fall in great stripes across your cheeks as he just stared.  Blankly in shock at your temper, his hand reaching in a claw towards you shoulder.  Hesitantly trying to show some measure of shock to your increasing hysteria at his ineptitudes.  Privately very pleased to see him pull it swiftly back in reflex to you baring your canines and growling in warning; adding one more sentence to your bitter education.  Adding the one thing that was likely to make it all bearable. In less than twenty-four hours you would have little to no control over anything, but this would mean that it did not have to become permanent.  You would make this demand, surely it was acceptable given how low he thought you were.

“If you bite my, if you try and force a bond General; I will murder you in your sleep.”

You had of course prepared a much more eloquently intelligent speech in your head, one that was less a threat and more a bargain.  But under the weight of the anger in your emotions, it soon dropped to a snarled warning.  You didn’t know if you could hurt the man; let alone murder him in his sleep.  But you sure as hell were not about to put up with being bonded to a man who saw you as so far beneath him; that you were practically livestock.  Had he not of been given you, he wouldn’t have stopped to help had you been dying in the street.  At least on the brightside, there would be no kits to come from this forced copulation; he had kindly made sure of that.  It was just going to be you two who were being dragged through all of this.

“I assure you (y/n), I have no intentions of making this any harder than it already is, rest assured that my behaviour as far as I am able to, will be as gentlemanly as possible; I will be gentle; especially if this is the first time you have experience intercourse.”

There was a molecule of frustration in his voice and you lowered your face in annoyance of his calmness.  Your eyes rolled back in your head, the heels of your hands quickly pressed into the sockets in frustration as you sighed deeply.  You could feel the press of his finger, the heat radiating from his other hand as it lifted your chin back to face him in a small attempt at comfort.  Trying to attempt in the lull of your silence to comfort you.  An acrimonious sense of understanding rising up on you as, it dawning on you, that he still hadn’t gotten how seriously it would affect him.  You spoke slowly, through gritted teeth that enunciated each word like acid.  Handled carefully as not to upset the fractious balance between you both. 

 

“This doesn’t work like human sex, you will not be driven by some gentlemanly need to be gentle, you will just want to fuck me.  It will be rough and raw, because that’s how these things work; you won’t care for anything more than the act itself.”

“I am sure my human side will allow for some leniency.”

He was as derisive of your opinion of what was going to happen as you were of his refusal to accept it.  Though both of you were attempting to be civil, you couldn’t believe that this was still his opinion of himself.  General Hux reacting to your scowl, frowning as he kept a hold of your chin; just waiting for you to break the silence.   

“You think you’re some sort of chimera General Hux?”

His eyes widened the tiniest amount at your challenge of his identity and his shoulder’s squared in a show of annoyance.  A suggestion was made to go to bed.  One that you knew was a suggestive more that the subject was becoming an uncomfortable topic, than that he was tired.  To discuss the act of copulating with an alien species was less distasteful to him, than the mere suggestion that his pristine bloodline was in any way tainted by his inhuman biology.  He was moving to get ready to return to his bed.  Walking to the other side and pushing aside the covers, ignoring the spot that you had risen to stand in as he folded back both sides of the bedding.  

You knew you should take this as an opportunity to return to you cage.  There was nothing to gain from sharing this truth with him, but as you twisted a piece of the material covering, you knew you couldn’t keep quiet.  It was difficult to decide if he honestly thought he spoke the truth, or if he had been lying to himself as much as you.      

“You can’t be there are no half breeds.”

You had not begun with any intent of malice, but as you began it was hard to keep the twisted smirk from your face as you played your power card.  Not having wholly realised what it had meant until his face lost its usual arrogant passiveness, turning white and his nostrils flared as he sought to control his breathing. 

“That is a misunderstanding, I am living proof of this, my father was a human and I am undoubtedly his biological offspring.”

His voice was surprisingly balanced for a someone who a minute ago had been so shocked that you knew he had accepted your words as the truth.  Now with his calmness the balance was slowly returning back to his favour.  You may have riled him, but he was not about to show it to you.  Not even when you shook your head, a gesture that made him leave off his fussing over the bedclothes and tighten his jaw ready to argue again that you were wrong.   

“There is no mistake General Hux, our physiology doesn’t allow for interspecies _breeding_ as you put it; you either are a human, or a kitsune not some weird amalgamation of the two.”

It was clear that there was to be no more discussions about the issue.  Not because he had told you to stop, but because with one final glare he left the room.  Almost running from it in great hurried strides that would have put his ship-board nemesis to shame.  Swiftly exiting his quarters in what you supposed just about passed as a quick march and not a run. 

Huffing you sat down, in a show of defiance on his bed and not the floor or your cage.  Almost wanting to scream into the room in rage.  It had meant to put you both on equal footing, to create some sense of normality around you both; not to have him running from you hours before he had engineered that you would need him.   

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I have again bought tickets for Star Wars Celebration, which means another long journey to spend time in my happy place. However I appear to have missed the Saturday Tickets, so if anyone ends up re-selling let me know.   
> On the plus side, I keep thinking a meet would be a good thing to set up for AO3, that is unless there is already one planned?


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> and now on to the NSFW part and someone is still in denial.

Every word of protest, every carefully worded challenge General Hux had scripted to the little Kitsune of his heritage, died on his lips as he opened the door to his chambers.  Forgetting that he was here to show her his carefully researched reasons as to why she was wrong to stand and listen.  Shocked despite her warnings, at the small breathy little whimpers coming from the bedroom.  Tasting the musky-sweet scent of female, that seemed to be everywhere in the air around him.  Almost cloying in its potency, it hung thickest as he approached the door to his bedroom.  Then as he activated the panel to slide back the door; raising in a heavy potency, until it almost brought him to his knees.

He knew he had something to say, he had spent hours in his office and then on the bridge building an intelligent argument.  But the words that would form a coherent disagreement, with her misunderstandings, appeared to have fled his now lust addled mind and left him mute.  Suddenly stupid and unable to pick apart her premise with his version of events.  Just prowling the space of the door, staring down at the lithe little form writhing breathlessly atop of the bed.  Her body face down to the mess of sheets and pillows that had been when he had left them his pristinely tidy bed.

She looked back at him and he swallowed hard at the scene she presented to him.  Lost initially to her need and practically humping the hand she had placed between her legs.  Her face flushed a pretty-pink, showing both deep arousal and mortification at being found in such a state of being.  Then as her eyes focused something worse than embarrassment; fear.  She was frightened of him, of what he would do with her and that hurt his ego far worse than could be expected.  He had tried to discuss this sensibly with her last night.  To ask her what he could have done to ease what he was not convinced was not her first mating (he had had yet to have an answer to that question).  The act he was supposed to participate in was uncomfortable enough without her being terrified of him, he had no desire to bed some weeping virgin; he needed to do something. 

He was genuinely unsure as to what this was.  He General Hux was hardly without experience, but that had been gained when his time permitted it with paid sex workers; professionals in their field.  There had been no need to please them, and certainly no need to worry about them having to see him ever again; and there was never a repeat performance.  They had been simply hired to release tension and to ensure he maintained the working order of his equipment.  Just something extra when a simple wank would not work, and when he had fancied a treat.  Nothing to what he felt looking at her; nothing to what his body suggested this would be to him. 

“Please.”

That one spluttered plea of a request slid from you lips before you had time for your pride to reign it back.  Refusing to ask for more; but pulling your unsteady legs to your knees.  Readying yourself, unsure if it was to go to him to beg, or if it was to haughtily try and remove yourself from his presence.  Stopped by the firm press of his full chest to your arched back, his entire body enveloping you whilst his face pressed to the crook of your neck, breathing deeply. 

“I have you little Kitsune, shush.”

Her pitiful little plea had been almost too much for General Hux and it had taken all the control he had, not to take her there and then the second she uttered her painful request.  Stopping himself only after he had sprung for her back, berating himself for the brutishness of his behaviour as he felt her rise to press himself against him.  Rubbing himself over her frightened little body, mingling the two scents together until they made a pleasing amalgamation. 

“I know all too well what it is to feel afraid, won’t bite you I promise.”         

She was terrified; and be damned if she came out of the other side of this thinking he was some sort of crass animal.  Instead he twisted his fingers into his sheets, the soft, yielding stark-whiteness contrasted against the black grip of each gloved fist.  Aware as he looked over whilst kissing the smattering of exposed skin around the neckline of his borrowed top, that she too looked down at him doing so. Her mouth parted, eyes pressing closed as he passed his lips from one side of her neck to the other, nestling his nose into the underside of her hairline and breathing in deeply.  Running her scent so deeply into his nostrils that he almost thought that he could taste it.  Practically purring against her as one hand left the bed, curling under them both to pull her tighter to him.  Muttering more promises made into her as he did so that he had her, that he would be gentle.  As much to soothe his own fears that he would lose it and become feral.    

You had expected a raw maleness from the man who thought so little of you, and not the soft rumblings of a man trying to put a frightened animal at ease.  His mouth pressing a kiss to the swollen skin around the gland at your neck, eliciting a shiver that ran your entire body.  Leaving you to whine loudly and turn your face to him, looking back once more over your shoulder.  This time not to a clenched jaw and flaring nostrils, but to patiently waiting lust blown eyes that seemed to follow the even tiniest of movements you made. 

This was all wrong, the opposite of what you had been told to expect; what you had practically witnessed from the tiny glimpses gasping parings of others and you were not sure if this was a disappointment to you.  He should be naked by now, and not deftly stroking your side soothingly.  You should be harshly pressed face down to the mattress and being fucked raw.  He should not be nosing gently into your neck, kissing and licking at the spot where your scent hung heaviest.  He shouldn’t just be rubbing his own scent on you, he should have his teeth pressed deep into it.  To both claim and hold you still as he fucked you. 

It unnerved you.  This gentleness was not what you had expected of a man so cruel.  Where did this restraint come from, how was it that he was able to keep so controlled of the situation when you were practically falling apart.  It all felt so good; too good.  It had been hours of you sat alone with this slowly building heat.  Unable to summon him for help, you had done the best you could to ease it.  Now with him here you were more than accepting of his intentions, submitting to his manipulation of you, for all your hand had been itching to protectively cover your bonding gland.  Ignoring the impulse as leather stoked your sides, more attempts to be unnecessarily soothing.  He at least found it difficult to speak, the fist signs that this was perhaps not all that easy as he was pretending.  His jaw set to a hard line for all he kept his lips supple with each almost tender suck against the flesh of your neck, the softness all most too much for someone this on edge.  Someone who just needed to be taken, who could only nod an acceptance not of his assurances; but of his hands on you.

Now with his arm wrapped around you, any initial worries that his calmness stemmed from a lack of desire were dismissed by the obvious signs.  Wiggling yourself against him, you could feel the heavy press of a throbbing erection pressed between the cracks of your arse.  Pressed firmer to you almost as an offering, as his back left you.  The General straitening up, keeping you tight to his chest with the officious limb wrapped around your waist.  Refusing to let you go as he pulled you up to kneeling with him.  His actions growing firmer with each passing moment.  With each new touch, this male was surprising you with his controlled boisterousness.  His gentleness less that of an alpha and more that of a beta male, for all his scent proudly proclaimed him as all alpha.  The spice in his musk making your mouth water, and your already slick and ready pussy throb with impossibly increasing need.  His fingers walking the knobs of your spine, each passing bump grazed with a kiss.  Your body was already swollen with excitement, and the promise of fulfilment in the alpha’s smell was making you dizzier.  You needed him, far more than he seemed to need you and that was unsettling to say the least; he was supposed to be as desperate as you were.    

It was all going to pot, you had set yourself certain rules.  Made little agreements with yourself that you were going to be the voice of reason in all of this.  That you would need to guide him and tell him off when he over stepped the mark.  Instead he was certainly the one leading; and you most definitely were happy following.  Eyes flickering open in bashful surrender as you permitted him to free your torso from the tangle of his clothing.  Your hands pressing to your exposed breasts for all you had previously maintained that you were not shy of your naked body.  His body swift to close the gap between you; the air cool where it could settle against the prickly heat of your skin.  His wool-spun shirt surprisingly soft for all it rigidly covered the gap between you both. 

A gloved hand apiece pressed over your own to cup your breasts.  Fingers splayed between your own as his mouth began and assault of your cheek.  His chin nosing at you, working to tilt your mouth back to his.  His lips far less restricted that his hands had been as they pecked at the corner of your mouth.  Sloppy and forceful as they prised your own open and his tongue swept your own.  The rumblings of a growl beginning in the pits of his lungs and working almost to an almost lowly audible snarl against your mouth.  One that made you wilt against him in surrender.  His kiss becoming increasingly harder and more full of teeth. Pulling at the bottom lip until it was stretched taught by his retreating mouth.  Relinquished only for his teeth to press softly into the top of your spine a trail of lax, loosely placed nips to the waistline of his pilfered underpants.  Your only reply another gasped, please as his fingers curled the elastic of the scrap of material, that was pushed lower down your hips.  Wanting to rip them off for him, stopped by a warning bit to each wrist to submit. 

What the kriffing hell was wrong with him.  Yes, she had warned General Hux that both of them would be desperate, but he hadn’t realised that this would be that difficult to control.  Or that he would be _that_ willing to have her.  Now with her body prostrated further forwards he continued undressing her.  Wishing he could just give in and rip the flimsy cloth from her instead of following some self-righteous, gentlemanly need to go slowly with her.  Ignoring the rising need to shove his cock inside of her, pin her to his bed and pound her until she could do little else but scream his name.  Settling instead for a firmly placed hand at her spine, splayed flat and lowering her shoulders to the bed.  Her thick, bushy tail, flicked nonchalantly to the side by the other hand.  Taking a moment to steady his nerves, before his predominate arm wrapped around her thighs as he lowered his face to her waiting snatch.  Uncaring of the mess his previously hesitant self would have refused to touch, to taste her. Grinning into her at the lustful screech she made at the first contact of his lips with her more intimate ones.  Revelling in the gloriousness of her, frustrated that he hadn’t practiced this more with others, when to his dismay she instead of repeating it lowered her cheek to the mattress.  Just laying there, panting into what was a loosely curled fist.  Her index finger curled and placed between her teeth.  Pinched there by her sharply shaped little canines, her eyes again screwed tight as he licked a broad swipe up the mess she had already made of her pussy.  In his enthusiasm almost working up to her ass.  Her tail raising at its base, flattening as he ran the underside back down to her folds.  Exploring it with little flicks and sucks that he really looked to her reactions to guide him in, wishing he had paid more attention.  But then the other women he had laid with wouldn’t have dared to make noises like this one did in his presence.  Nor would he have cared to have heard them like he did her, striving to lengthen each gasp and increase the volume of each whimpered direction.  Following her directions until he reached a spot that in stead of having her cry hoarse instructions had her struggle to even remember to breath correctly, her legs trembling so much that the vibrations travelled up her tail.  The copper length now draped over his shoulder and he mouth open, struggling to pull in each panted lungful.  Her words an incoherent babble, that he was secretly so proud of. 

Kriffl; he was far from experienced in what he was doing, yet he appeared to make up for it with total enthusiasm and a surprisingly humble ability to follow what little direction you could give him.  His usually rigid-self lost to an unexpected need to please you.  His grip tightening to your thighs as your legs grew weaker from their shaking.  A tightening in the further most reaches of your belly suggesting that if he continued you would most certainly cum against his face.  One of the sheets twisted in your fingers, your teeth almost scissoring into the curled-up finger in your mouth.  The knuckle almost aching from the constant pressure from your jaw.  He was a fast learner, and it seemed eager to do so, quickly learning to suck your clit into his mouth and deftly pin it there. Repeatedly running increasingly complicated patters along it, almost experimenting to see which could make you moan the loudest. 

Her moans seemed to grow in both pitch and frequency the more he worked her over.  The desire not so much to have her, as to possess her becoming more insistent with each strumming pulse of syrupy thick blood through his heated veins.  Determined that he would make this memorable; his bloated ego leading him in a direction otherwise mundane to him.  Women had of course achieved their climaxes with General Hux, for all he had never set out to ensure any one of them had.  Not that he was entirely selfish, more that he paid them to please him, not the other way around and so their pleasure was inconsequential to him.  But he knew from those smattering of rare experiences that she was close.  That knowledge was for once driving his cock wild with the thought of seeing her come undone for him; preferably around him.  The almost instant erection he had gotten on scenting her, was becoming more painfully insistent by the moment. Chaffing against the small space the confines of his work trousers allowed him.  Demanding of him, that he release it.  If nothing else, to save it from the uncomfortable mess his precum seemed to be making of his previously clean pants and not as he had planned to in one swift move sheathe his stiff cock inside of her tight little pussy. 

You had not been expecting him to be inside you this quickly, or so eagerly.  The burn as his thick shaft split you open was a shock, but a pleasant one.  Wiggling around it as your pussy stretched to comfortably allow him to pull back.  Flattered at the growl he made as you arched your back, allowing his hips to fit flush to your raised thighs, his balls pressed to the overly sensitive skin around your clit as he snapped his hips forward to enter you once more.       

Maker she was impossibly tight, either that, or somehow he was so much harder than usual.  His cock twitching inside of her wet cunt, her neck tempting as he leant forwards to nip he shoulder.  Biting hard enough to leave marks and refraining from the growing itch to clamp his jaws tight to the mound of flesh further up.  Remembering at the last moment to work his mouth back down her spine.  Finger tips pressed so tightly to her waist that he knew they would leave bruises above the curve of her hips.  The leather shielding her from being pierced by his nails, biting his lips as he struggled to keep the strokes of his cock temperate in their thrusts.  Continuously repeating his motto that would be gentle he was not an animal.

“Faster, please I need it harder.”

The whined command was breathless and submissive for all it was an order.  His own eyes melted an entirely lust-blown black that mirrored acceptance in his.  Her panting all the encouragement he needed to speed up his movements, increasingly doing so at each strangled order to increase his speed.  Forgetting his original intentions to take her like a gentleman, to instead fuck her harder than he ever had any whore.  Doing so far past what he would have guessed to be his limits, pounding her until she was unable to keep up.  Lips pulled tight back to bare his teeth in a snarl as his hips bounced off the firm muscles of her buttocks, one hand spread between her shoulder blades, the other twisting into russet lengths to further arch her back.  Letting his cock penetrate the last few millimetres to rub against the sponginess of her cervix.  Her muscles tightening on him as he stroked the walls of her sex, clenching tight enough to threaten to milk him dry.  Her repeated mantra of encouragement lost to wordless mewls, as she submitted and just let him fuck her.  Her mouth open panting, drool spilling past her plump limps to stain his pillows.  Her thighs wet with slick, spread further by his cock, breath raggedly spurting forth from his chest. The scent of sex tainted heavily with one other’s pheromones, her pussy constricting tighter and tighter on him until with a yowl he came.  His hips stuttering as he gave two more strangled thrusts into her.  His pride realising with absolute relief as he flopped over her that he had done it. 

Your orgasm was the strongest yet, but then it was the only time you had achieved it with another male of your kind.  The pulsing cum now filling your womb thankfully bringing with it the promise of a few hours of blessed relief from your heat.  His uniform itchy against your sweat soaked back, his knot filling you and keeping you pinned far better than the pleasant weight of his body covering yours.  His hands elbows dug either side of you to let him nuzzle into the back of your neck.  Pressing a single kiss as he struggled to find words, pressing to rise and leave you. Stopped by an angry yelp from you as he tried pulling his un-ready cock from you.   

“What the actual!”

You looked back at him.  Practically rolling your eyes at his ignorance until you remembered that you were supposed to be treating his naivety with understanding.  To be the one teaching a man who sadly had not the education you had.  Trying to keep the annoyance from your voice and knowing you couldn’t as you tried to sooth him.  Too exhausted to go into it until you had had a nap.  

“You knotted, it will pass.”             


	11. Chapter 11

The steel-coated, insulated mug of tarine tea General Hux gripped loosely in his hand had long since gone cold.  Still he refused to take the time to break from his thoughts to pass it over to a droid.  His jaw clamped tight in what he told himself was a sentient refusal to speak and not because he did not trust himself.  Assuring himself that it was not for fear of a slip up, or that his body was finding it difficult to concentrate on anything other than the naked kitsune currently squirreled away in his quarters.  Annoyed when he should have been behaving at optimum competence and not constantly fixated on the intermittently throbbing demands of his cock. 

Earlier in that cycle, they had intercepted vessels with known suspected ties to the remnants of the Resistance. Taking no chances, General Hux had given the orders to decimate the ships; allowing it to serve as a warning to any who thought to give the scuttling rats quarter.  Smirking as the Finalizer had passed through the detritus to continue towards to their destination.  There was no need to still their course to check the odd survivor had finally perished.  Pride making him ignore the readings showing the odd signs of organic survival, they wouldn’t last long in the cold dark vacuum of space.  The efficiency a true show of a man very much in control of his domain.  One who commanded with the uttermost authority; a true show of order and discipline.  

“General Hux.”

Eyes more blue than green, raised to greet the menace that had joined him on the bridge.  Refusing to unlock his jaw to offer his Supreme Leader the same respect in a greeting.  Instead narrowing his eyes and lamenting the change of atmosphere aboard the Bridge.  It had been so quiet and serine in the absence of the chaos that seemed to cloak Kylo Ren.  Amongst him each officer and underling had been preforming their duties to the utter most precision.  Now they seemed almost too hyper-focused on their work.  Avoiding each other to concentrate their attentions on the control panels in front of them in a way which hindered rather than encouraged productiveness.  Each minion desperately showing their loyalty to him, their actual leader and not the supposed new leader.  Everyone of them using their now stoically ingrained skills, the ones his academies and training programs had spent years honing into what were now his very best soldiers. Indeed, he was very proud of his men. Their performance was one of the finest tells of the well-oiled machine that was the First Order at its finest, each man or woman’s focus purely on their given tasks. 

“You were not in your quarters as expected General.”

General Hux was careful to note a report flashing as needing urgent attention on his data pad, the alerts silenced before turning to face Kylo Ren.  Taking a small mouthful of the tepid bitter liquid, swishing it around his tongue, before he chose to meet the calmly taunting eyes of his Commander in chief.  Deliberately ensuring his new leader knew where to expect any demands to sit in General Hux’s priority lists.

“Ren.”

The simple moniker was both an insult and a direct refusal to refer to Kylo Ren by his full title in the presence of his men.  The sneer that went with it, the closest Hux could politely risk to an outright challenge without seeming to have found jealousy at the man’s new title.  He could not let on that it bothered him, his pride was forcing him to choose his battles.  If the refusal to completely bend the knee bothered Kylo Ren, then annoyance was not to be seen openly by the hulking black-robed man.  Instead there followed a deep sigh before a wide smirk plastered his face, one that unlike Hux’s showed no pride, but nasty amusement at the words that were to follow.

“Strange that I should find your mate alone.  You had orders to breed her did you not General, ones that given your current proximity to her I doubt are being obeyed.”

A less skilful man would have lacked the orderly ability to control his annoyance at being reprimanded in his domain of authority.  The Bridge, like his ship and the entirety of the First Order military resources were his to command; he had earnt that right by both birth and by years of training.  He should have been declared the new supreme leader; not this idiot who had only wrestled that right through some mystical power.  He should be taunting the son of a base born smuggler, not the other way around.  Around the men, there was the tapping of buttons and fingers to touch pads, too constant to be actual work.  For all no one dared to look up from their work, Hux was well aware, that his men were not as oblivious to the powerplay being hashed out before their very eyes.  Each one refusing to even look out of the view ports, each one seemingly busy with work, tapping away at screens they did not need to.  All desperate not to be drawn into anything that could result in either of their commanding officer’s taking their fury out on them.

“She has a comms device, should she wake and need assistance again she need only page me for it.”

General Hux was pleased with the smoothness of his reply.  Smug at being able to show he had outsmarted Ren and still been able to perform the tasks demanded for him as a part of his role within the First Order.  He had lowered himself by mating with her, he had even watched as horrified he could not withdraw from her body after having done so.  He had been disgusted and humiliated at having to lay there in the mess of their combined fluids, waiting until the unnaturalness of his animal side abated and let him return to being human once more.  Now he would be damned if he would be castigated for having done all of that and been able to drag himself from her.  For returning to work as befitted a man of his station.  

Instead Kylo Ren seemed to have made his way back to General Hux.  Taking his time in doing so, drawing out the tension in the room, and making Hux impatient.  So much so that he did not think to step back as Ren came to stand toe to toe with him. Dipping forwards and tilting his head to allow him to taunt the General with a low mockery of concern.

“Strange that I should have found her alert and writhing on your bed.” 

The voice had been monotonic and deliberately falsely disinterested.  But Hux was furious that Kylo Ren was admitting that he had been trespassing in his chambers.  More so that neither his security systems, nor that his Kitsune had alerted him to the intrusion.  His grip tightened on the beaker of tea, his nostrils flaring as he fought to regain his racing heart.  Unable to step back without looking weak he stood taller, squaring his shoulders and turning to face the goading face of Kylo Ren.  Unprepared for where it next went, or his own reactions.     

“She smells amazing General, do you know how hard it was not to give her what she was demanding, and I am just a mere human.  How much harder would it be for someone like-”

His sentence went unfinished.  Trailing off not because General Hux had swung the hand cradling his tea at him, but because Kylo Ren had said enough to get the desired rise from him.  General Hux no longer as aware of his surroundings as he was the still smirking face of Kylo Ren.  The man having been pleased both at threatening him with his recent proximity to his female and with assuring him openly that he knew of his mother’s unnatural linage.  Panting he almost had enough control to walk away and save face.  Turning on his heels, he was about to let it go and exit the Bridge.  Shifting his shoulders back to a better posture, until Kylo Ren added another layer to his sneering jab at General Hux.

“Is she too much for you General, I could help you.”

It was too much for Hux. The empty tea canister was dropped and one of Hux’s hidden blades slipped into the palm of his hand. The movement fluidly executed from muscle memory and hours of dedicated practice to staying alive at the bullying hands of his father.  All disregarded as with a simple flick of his wrist Kylo Ren sent him flying over the nearest control panel.  The officer stationed there serving as a crash pad for a no less irate General Hux.        

It was humiliating to pull himself up off the floor.  His subordinate knowing better than to do anything that would show himself up.  Shuffling back from the two warning leaders and disappearing somewhere beyond his line of peripheral vision.  Taking the time to straighten himself up as subtly as he could without looking flustered by his dishevelment.  The pain of the fall doing little to abate his fury at the challenge Ren had presented or the frustration that he felt in having to snarl his reply to the man’s back.  Kylo Ren fixated not on General but the wide viewport and the winking expanse of space.      

“She is napping Ren, when she is not I will return.  I see no reason to mollycoddle her into thinking that I can devote an excessive amount of my time solely to her carnal desires.”

Strangely he could almost taste the lie, but he was sure Ren had not.  He had spent too long perfecting his mind for it to fall prey to any simple Jedi tricks.  Having known what it was to work under Darth Vader himself, his father had known what it was to need the privacy of one’s own thoughts.  Simple mental exercises and regular beatings had taught him as a young boy to keep his emotions from being read.   

Ren however seemed to lack that simple ability, he was driven by his emotions.  It was so simple to see the glee at being able taunt General Hux.  Still he was so damned sure that had Ren had not actually been in his chambers; still he could not shake the anger at the suggestion that he had been there before him, or the understated threat of what he had offered.  His rooms were his, what was in it was his; especially it currently seemed, her.  So much so that he was able to control the steps that he took from the Command Bridge.  Keeping his strides tight and controlled.  A slow, business-like tempo that led him to the turbo-lift, his steps slowly speeding the further he got from the Bridge.  Telling himself that he was not punching the buttons; but pressing in the security code and co-ordinates.  Hands gripped behind the curve of his spine, foot tapping in impatience as the six seconds it took to reach the corridor of his quarters took the longest of his life.   

Kylo Ren had not lied, you were of course awake.  Naked and very much uncomfortable, as each nerve cell in your body demanded with a prickly heat to be touched.  It was humiliating to think that this was to be expected with a man who had been so desperate to fuck you and walk away.  Clinically instructing you how to use a pager when you woke and needed him to come back to you.  Assuring you that he would be back as soon as he could; ensuring that you understood that you were never to be a priority.  Scary to think it could be more than once, that the whole of this heat you were to be fucked and then left with a button to request he come to relieve you like you were some animal demanding to be mated; just a bitch in heat.

Except that in some ways you were that.  It was sickening, but also something that you had been thankfully prepared for.  You had good examples set for you of what to expect; and shame had never been a part of your education on the subject.  It was supposed to be a truly wonderful thing to share with an attentive mate, when you had both picked the time to allow this to happen.  One who would stay by you and take care of you throughout the whole of Oestrus.  It was all supposed to be a choice you would make as a partnership.  You were supposed to pick who and when; not to have it dictated to you.  You were not supposed to have woken alone, dripping with slick, dehydrated, and with no sign of your supposed mate anywhere.   

Sniffing you bothered to waste some of your bodies precious reserves on misty eyes.  Your body too preoccupied with its need to fulfil its biological imperative to be able to truly cry.  Unable to understand how an alpha Kitsune was able to walk away.  Furious that General Hux was able to overcome his biological directive and you were not.   

Now that you were well into your heat, it was even harder not to pick up the definite smells of male.  They were everywhere.  His bedding held an abundance of it, the sheets and pillows too thick with it to help with the abundance of slick that fell from you pussy.  The wetness somewhat more that it had been the night before as you shifted the pillows around you.  Laying enough around you that if you closed your eyes you could pretend there was another body behind you.  Rutting against the one between your legs and adding your fingers to card through the mess pooled there.

It was not enough, nothing would be enough baring the stretch of a male’s cock inside of you.  The pulsing strum of an alpha’s knot as it filled you and offered you some temporary relief from the madding sense of desperate need.  Even your fingers slipping inside of you failed to offer relief; or the weak orgasm they coaxed from you.  Still you were certainly not prepared to give in and as directed.  Nothing short of death making you want to stoop to telling him that he was needed, not after doing this to you.

You didn’t think he was entirely ignorant to your needs.  He was too intelligently read not to have read every text he could have found on the subject; and you could imagine that being an extensive list.

So when he finally decided to grace you with his very presence, it was fair to say that your temper was beyond frayed.  Vulnerable in your choice of position you dismounted from the pillows and turned to face him.  Blinking in surprise and longing at the echoed answer of a growl to your own snarl.  This one server and angry, low enough in tone to turn the throbbing inside your core into a painful cramp. Whimpering as you pulled back to the head board.  Smearing the wetness on your fingers along one of the pillows as you struggled against your bodies desire to suggest a more submissive approach.

“Did you ask Ren to fuck you?”

If the thunderous look on his face wasn’t enough to tell you that he was well and truly pissed off; then the venomous timbre to his question was.  Making you shake with fear as he stripped off his tunic, toeing off his boots whilst he used his teeth to pull of his gloved.  The press of them to his own flesh making you gulp, your legs a mess of jelly, fear and ice.

You were too afraid of upsetting him, of antagonising him any further to do little more than shake your head.  Your lips forming around the word no as he placed one hand on the bed.  Bending over and crawling towards you.  Silver-blue eyes spitting sparks, as he reached close enough to grip your ankle; looking you dead in your own eyes as he pulled you under him.  Crawling the final distance, and then with no real warning mounting you.

You had not even realised that he had unbuttoned his pants until he was fully seated inside of you.  His chest covered by his undershirt, but thankfully pressed to your own. His mouth on yours in a cruel kiss, full of teeth and tongue before he rolled his hips.  Hands sliding between you and the bed to pull your ass tighter to his.

She was frightened, that much Hux knew.  But unlike earlier he seemed unable to control himself. His hips snapping faster and harder as he tried to drive his cock in deeper inside of her.  Her helpless whimpers against his mouth only spurring him to try harder.  There was no thought as to if it was rational or not to want to punish her for his jealousy.  Breaking off his kiss to drag her over his lap as his arse fell back onto his ankles.  Hands dug bruisingly hard into her hips as he slid further yet inside her.  His cock head bottoming out against the spongy head of her cervix and still wishing he could go further.  A desperate part of him wanting to hurt her to, relishing the power he seemed to have over her and the way it made her clench tighter around his cock.  

Squealing, you had let him manhandle you.  Your arms needing to wrap around his neck for security, forehead pressed into the nape of his neck.  Panting as he finally gave your body what it needed, helpless to do little more than meet his thrusts; afraid to look in to his eyes.  Scared if this was how enthralled you were with the way he was fucking you; how much more would you be if there was possession shown in the set of the jaw. The very one that seemed to refuse to leave you alone, teeth nipping at every spare space of skin they could find.

There was the sting left behind by some bites, that suggested he could have broken skin.  Yet he was courteous enough to stay to your left side, some little more than hard sucks, others a long press of his teeth.  Most you knew would leave bruises behind when this was done.  The thought of them littering your neck and shoulder hurrying you to spread you legs wider, grinding yourself on the skin above his cock and shuddering at the rough contact.  Hands tangling in the mess of your hair to pull your mouth back to him, the taste of iron suggesting that he handed over more than just saliva in his kiss. 

His eyes were blown black when he broke off to pant.  Silver silvers of blue eclipsed around black pitted holes that hypnotized your breath, holding in in stasis as you stared.  His own breath warm against your spit slickened lips, his own as swollen as your felt; your breath returned in a sharp inhalation as his tongue split the line of spittal that held them to your own.

“Did you ask Ren to fuck you?”

You’d answered that, but it seemed from his tone that his anger had not been abated by your gestured denial.  This time words added to the shocked protests that you had done no such thing.

“He was here, but no; you said not to speak to him.”

General Hux could not remember having given the verbal command for her not to speak with Ren.  Still it stuttered his hips in their movements, the guilt at realising that she had been loyal to him, doing precious little to still the need to keep fucking her.  Knowing that she had again held her tongue for him more of a turn on perhaps than the jealousy.  Her own body a shrill cry of relief as rigid muscles shook her release through her.  Her cunt clamped tight on the bulbus thing that held himself and his cum inside of her.

He had not realised that he had gripped her so tightly, until it came to letting go his iron grip on her.  Shuffling forwards to lay her back against the sheets.  Wincing at the temporary pull of his cock, and the twitch of her own muscles clamping tighter in a well evolved refusal to let him go.  His hands stroking through her hair, struggling to hold himself off her; he didn’t want to crush her.         


	12. Chapter 12

General Hux had not meant to fall asleep; let alone still coupled and entwined with his Kitsune.  Nor had he expected the small whimper she made at him stirring, to harden his cock once more.  General Hux not getting up and returning to work, but instead growling into the soft shell of her ear.  Inhaling thick breaths loaded with her scent, as he pressed her back onto the mattress.  Her little mouth stretching into a yawn as he woke her.  Her legs stiffly sliding open in nervous, yet willing submission as he slotted himself readily between her thighs and entered her. 

This time his coupling with her, was a little less demanding; though no less authoritative.  His thrusts hard and focused; though not the frenzied humping they had been in the hours before her nap.  His mouth fixated on the fragile skin around the collar circling her neck.  Sucking blossoming marks in a variety of purples where the offending article would allow.  Leaving his semi-permanent marks of a possible claim on her, each one less gentle than the last. barely listening to her strangled moan not to bite there, as his teeth grazed over the skin covering the sensitive gland towards the nape of her neck.

It was amazing how quickly her writhing stopped, her breath held as she held still under him.  General Hux hushing her, before adding more promises that he would not dream of doing so; moving aside her hand.  Then waited for the sharp intake of air, and her shoulders to go lax once more, before returning to softly nibbling around it; licking broader swipes over it.  Ignoring the ache in his jaw that suggested it could be soothed by clamping his teeth around it.    

General Hux flat out refused to let the part of him that baulked at the suggestion he would do something to crass as to keep her permanently win.  He was not about to let anything else take over what was becoming a unexpectedly pleasant experience for him.  For the first time ever he was beginning to understand why people truly enjoyed sex.  How they could just let themselves go and enjoy the mess and the sweat of it all; rather than it just being a means to a pleasant end.  Chest to hers, he was fast losing himself in panting thrusts that transferred easily through her body.  Yet struggling to let go of the groan he wanted to, at the reaction her pussy had to his mouth on what was obviously a sensitive spot on her body.  Nuzzling and licking firmly over the gland, just to enjoy seeing her unravel under him.  Pinning her hands when the action seemed too much to her; hissing at the rush of stinging air to the patches of skin she had been holding tight onto.  Proud to see the molten brown of her irises, replaced in their entirety by liquid black.  Unable to entirely accept to himself how much it pleased him to see her so helpless beneath him.  How much he was beginning to enjoy coupling with her; how much he would miss this when it was over. 

It would be over too soon for his liking if he did not do something about it.  Reaching under her fingers searched through the wetness to rub at her swollen clit, enjoying even more the way she keened as her body shook and tightened.  Playing her into one juddering, weakening orgasm after another. Shuddering in not at all unpleasant shock when her teeth nipped at a similar spot on his neck and he could do little else but collapse into her.  Pouring himself into her and letting a strangled stream of expletives free as she gave a last clench around what was now his much thicker knot.  Gulping back control again of his breathing, he needed her to accept that he was still under control here.  Golden-brown eyes seemed to be glued wide open to him, this closeness somehow understood to be her trusting something of him.  The respect allowing him to let a little of his own guard down, smirking at the helpless way she mewled in response to him toying with each sensitive spot on her salty skin as he slowly drifted down from his high.

 

For you, the last forty-eight hours were a complete blur of need and fulfilment.  But you were far more willing to accept that the way General Hux had just fucked you this time.  It seemed that unlike the first time, he was far less of him providing you a service.  Nor was it entirely just that he was under the thrall of his biology. 

In fact, very little of the way he had taken you over the last cycle, were indicative of an alpha male’s rut.  Whilst he had been rough and possessive, he had shown entirely too much control.  Surprising you as he had forgone all earlier protests that this was nothing for him but an order; and instead taken pleasure in you enjoying the act.  Leaving you completely wreaked and exhausted, your limbs gone to jelly from the repetitive strain of each orgasm. 

Now, flat on your back, this was perhaps not the most comfortable of positions to be knotted in.  But given everything it was a small price to pay for what had been a more than pleasant experience.  It had not been at all what you expected of a cold, unpassionate man.  Nor had you supposed before this, that he would take the time to hold you tighter to roll you both over.  Twisting until you were laid much more comfortably splayed across his chest.  His hands ignoring the sweat sheen pained on your skin, to trail up and down your spine.  Your breathing slowing down to match the strokes of his fingers and your eyes repeatedly flickering to half-open.  Fighting against the need to let them fall shut.  Aware you should discuss the reasons General Hux had burst in here, but not wanting to let go of any of this a click more than you had to.  Enjoying for once the feeling of security General Hux was inadvertently setting; the one he was supposed to have set from the outset.

“Did Kylo Ren come in here?”

He was almost nonchalant in his question, still you stiffened at the mention of your tormentor’s name.  Remembering all to well how it felt to be terrified and alone with him.  Relaxing against the General, when he kept up the soothing movement along your spine.  Unhurried in his actions, he waited until you had let go the tension in your limbs to hum a reminder that he had spoken a question, a suggestion that you should answer his question.  Tickling the base of your neck until you sighed against him and closed your eyes to enjoy the touch.

“He was here yes, but I did not speak to him or ask him to fuck me!”

Beneath you there was a tightening to the coil of muscles and the hint of a growl, making you wish you had not relaxed enough to let sass into your voice.  Cross that you were having to defend yourself again, you grit your teeth in a silent refusal to let your anger get the better of you and ruin what was so far a decent situation.  Whilst it could be true that you probably would have had little enough of a struggle with yourself, before letting that monster touch you; you had not asked him to fuck you.  General Hux already knew this; or did he not believe you?  That was the reason he had stormed in here wasn’t it, to punish you for tempting the man who had trespassed in his rooms.  He certainly had already thrown the accusation at you at least once, that you had asked Kylo Ren to fuck you. 

“I told you this!”

“Watch your attitude!”

This time he did growl as you and scrambling you slid off him and onto your knees, no longer able to trust the close proximity to him.  Snarling back the attitude in your voice, you had turned your chin to look over to him. Eyes wide and fearful; watchful of a possible threat.  Your body again less languid at having to recall having that other monster, whilst dealing with displeasing the alpha in the small but laughable sanctuary of these rooms.

“I left you a comms device, you should have paged me.”

It seemed redundant to answer a question he already knew the answer to.   Your subsequent protests that you had kept quiet gone astray, as he reached forwards to tangle fingers into your hair.  Hushing your protests, as he pulled you back to him, thought thankfully only to lie next to him.  Coving you over with a thin sheet, stroking over the tips of your ears and scratching behind them.  Then to your shock, emitting almost a purring pattern of breathing, until you had reached another state of reassured quiet at his touch.

“I would much rather you had alerted me to his trespassing; for both of our sakes.”

His voice was stern, but the stroking continued until you could fully relax again.  Making you suspect that he had meant it to be soothing and dismissive of his original jealousy at having Kylo Ren in his rooms; whilst also chiding you for not contacting him.  Perhaps this too was you making him look a fool, like your refusal to talk had?  You were hardy reassured that had you had had you called he would have come straight away had he had more pressing issues.  Nor were you going to bring that up with him, it would lead to General Hux further impressing on you, that you should had summoned him for service.  The thought leaving a slightly bitter taste in your mouth, at the knowledge that he had had you down as an inconvenience and very much his inferior.  His own body barely had time to conceal his own alarm as you spoke a hurried, but stupidly thought rebuke as to why you could not have done.  Forging all your emotional reasons, to best pick the one that you thought both fitted and flattered his ego. General Hux, cleverly managing to keep his hand still agilely moving, and all but the smallest catch from his breath as you explained.

“He needs to think I’m some dumb animal, animals can’t use technology.”

There was a hint of sulk to your voice, and more so of a pout to your face.  But you knew you were right.  Had you used the coms device he had left you with, Kylo Ren would have been the first to use it to his advantage and subsequently your disadvantage.  Already he had hurt you physically as though it was a casual whim.  It seemed that General Hux’s leaders had both been cruel towards you; Kylo Ren most definitely in a way that showed he knew how to be better.  Different from the redhead’s casual and almost unknowing cruelty; it hurt as much as it humiliated.  Too accurate for it not to be that he knew how to be kind.  Like he knew how to act; however then instead ensured he did the exact opposite of what would have been considered the humane way to act.  Cold and calculated, you didn’t think it was all entirely personal to you; more that you were caught up in some sort of twisted cross-fire between the two leaders.  Your pain and distress, seemed to hit a raw nerve with the General, it seemed it was just another of Ren’s weapons to use against General Hux.

Sighing, General Hux put aside all thoughts of the mess he seemed unable to dig himself out of.  Refusing to deal with the guilt that plagued him at her failed escape run, then the punishment Kylo Ren gave her.  All First Order personnel had a locator chip of some sort.  The officers; the ones that showed a human face had them implanted in their belts; well Hux ensured that most of them did.  Her chip though was both unnecessary and cruel. a jab not just at what he was; but at what General Hux hid.  He had to admit that he was pleased with her thoughtfulness; she was anything but the unintelligent pet that idiot boy Kylo Ren thought she was; in fact her loyalty was proving refreshing.  It was completely at odds to the usual mindless devotion he received from the troops.  It deserved a reward, but he was also at a complete loss at how to soothe her.  Aware from the pillow placements, that she was slowly building a nest, he had thought best to let her settle into it.  Ensuring that she was placed furthest from the door, he had covered her up.  Deciding when she was settled to bring her own pillows and blankets from the cage, he lay back down with her.  Discerning from the differences in facial muscles where she wanted them.  Cocooning her in them, whilst setting the rooms temperature lower to keep her comfortable and pleased that she seemed to be slowly returning to the languid, post coital relaxed state. 

It dawned on him slowly, that it was pleasing to him to see her happy; that he took pleasure in seeing her comfortable and provided for.  That the fox side of his biology wanted to protect her and the nest she seemed inherently driven to build despite the impossible outcome of the union.  He wondered if his father had ever done this for his mother. Or if the cruel and demanding man he had been had been able to permit her comfort at even this time in her cycle.  Hoping that his mother had been, if only for a short while happy; that he had been brought to fruition in a nest like this one.  With at least a mother who cared enough to see him happy and looked after; loved even.  The sentiment was wasted, but he could not help momentarily indulging in the idea of it. He knew he couldn’t really remember her; that all he had was the impression of smells and shapes on his memory.  With his father now gone it was left to his prideful ego to wonder if he was somehow providing better for his mate than his father had his mother.  Watching her intently as he debated on what to do with her, selfishly quite pleased that she had not got away, yet also guilty that she was suffering. 

Survival of the fittest was one thing, but this was not what his vision had been for the First Order.  He was not about to be labelled the brutish bully his men had Kylo Ren marked as.  He was different, efficient and clinically cold if needed.  History and battle tactics had taught him to see the need for a bully, but they were animals and needed masters; he did not.        

His little-kitsune was asleep long before General Hux disentangled himself from her, to make his way to the shower.  Ignoring the sleepy heat from their combined bodies to go take a shower, only aware as he did so that he was washing her scent off himself along with the stale fluids.  Taking his time to think over what had happened on the bridge as much as what he had done to the little kitsune still curled up in a nest of blankets.  General Hux was clever enough to know when he had been played.  He was also intelligent enough to realise that somehow, he had played directly into Kylo Ren’s grubby hands.

Swearing he hit out at the wall, catching the control panel of the shower, and turning the temperature warmer to scrub away at his skin.  Realizing that short of making his claim on her, he had done exactly what he had sworn he would not do.  He had fucked her like an animal, clawing and biting her until they had both fallen to the mattress in sated exhaustion; then willingly done so again the next day.  He was fast losing touch of who he was because of her; of who he had made himself into and that had to stop. Survival of the fittest was one thing, but this was not what his vision had been for the First Order.  He was not about to be labelled the brutish bully his men had Kylo Ren marked as.  He was different, efficient and clinically cold if needed.  History and battle tactics had taught him to see the need for a bully, but they were animals and needed masters; he did not.        

He had decided something had to be done about it.  He needed to take back control and order; preferably by getting rid of her.  It did not take him long to realise that the best way to go about this, was to outright disobey Kylo Ren and dump her on the next available planet.  She was irrelevant; none of his time with her was.  She was a distraction, a waste of his time and the resources it took to house her on his ship.  There was no logical reason for his instruction to breed her, nothing to be gained but Ren’s spite.   

Grabbing a towel to wrap around him, he exited the shower.  Ignoring the temptation to wake the sleeping Kitsune and take his growing frustration out on her body.  Resisting once more covering himself in her scent.  Instead instructing the ships navigational computer to load a holo map of the current space sector. 

General Hux was conflicted as to where to send her.  He wanted to pick the next available planet, despite its suitability as a habitat to her.  Whatever morals he had, winning that debate, until it seemed he had decided against it.  Searching through the maze of jump points and hyperspace routes until he had settled on returning her home.  Pulling up the schematics and working the Finalizer on a plot closer to his chosen planet, arguing that they needed to make port near by to replenish natural supplies.  Citing a need for various plant-based chemicals in the ships manifesto; but ensuring that they picked the slowest least direct route.  He needed to be rid of his distraction; but needed nobody to guess what the trip was about.  It was time to let her run free.    


	13. Chapter 13

With the end of her heat General Hux was freed from the constant need to be confined to his quarters; and whatever spell her hormones seemed to have inflicted on his pitiful excuse for a body.  He seemed to be over the constant need to bed her; and at last able to return to his correct command station aboard the Bridge.  It seemed he had missed it all; the noise, the bustle of desperate workers; each one desperate to avoid falling under his vigorous scrutiny and of course the view of space from the massive view port.

He told himself that he did not miss the small kitsune.  Daily he went about his rouse to be rid of her.  Her cage this time, less of a confinement for the safety of his privacy; more for her protection from Kylo Ren.  The massive brute taking whatever moment he could to both taunt General Hux and to terrorise her. 

He had of course seen fit to visit General Hux towards the end of their mating schedule.  The frightened little kitsune waking with a yelp had scuttled quickly to join General Hux in the shower.  Her pointed teeth chattering despite the scalding temperature of the stinging droplets, slotting herself between him and the wall.  It had taken until her skin had turned pink, for Hux to finish and leave the shower.  Her eyes wide and fearful as he had soaped her down, stroking and gently coaxing her until he had managed to lead her out to what he had correctly guessed was a waiting Kylo Ren.  Deciding quickly from the grin he gave her, that she had no doubt found the black robed Supreme Leader, contemplating some plan or other to set about terrorising her and humiliating him.  Pleased when he simply smirked and left them to it. Hux debating if he had been wrong until he noticed the bed sheets had been tidied; Kylo Ren had been checking that General Hux had been doing his duty.

“General Hux.”

Sighing, General Hux prepared himself for today’s onslaught, he had most certainly not missed working alongside Kylo Ren.  His infatuation with chasing down and destroying the Scavenger was tiresome and repetitive.  An infatuation that seemed to take up more of his time than more urgent matters that should.  Urgent matters, like finding his mother, and at least putting her somewhere where she could not incite another rabble to follow her into another set of rebellious staged acts of terrorism.  Small mercies could be given though; at least it seemed to have taken his mind off taunting him; well up until today.

“Deveron General Hux; whatever possessed you to bring us back here.”

General Hux almost rolled his eyes.  The sarcasm and boredom rolled off Kylo Ren, echoing his words and sounding a warning louder than claxons to General Hux who had by now learnt to understand the petty and childish moods of the Supreme Leader.  The man-child truly was too predictable.  Knowing well enough when to manipulate them; but also when to outright avoid them.  It may have been him who managed the First Order assets and finances, but it was to Kylo Ren the budget went to be analysed; let him see the cost of his damages.  Perhaps if he better understood the cost, then by some miracle he would learn to leave the machinery alone; soldiers were far cheaper to replace. 

“Medical supplies; I have a list of the required supplies.”

He had been too quick to protest his innocence and Kylo Ren of course had to look over the supply request. General Hux smirking at the way brown eyes; gold flecked, darker and harder than the ones he was used to looking into scrutinized the itinerary.  Knowing full well that the mistakes that Kylo Ren looked for would not be there.  He had worked too hard to ensure that there was no hint of his deception.  The order having genuinely been filled by another officer as instructed.  If Kylo Ren wanted to interrogate the officer, he would find him completely unavailable; and just as difficult to locate aboard the Finalizer.  General Hux was taking no chances. 

Neither it seemed from the way he looked over the docket, was Kylo Ren.  His eyes narrowing as he looked back to a completely unreadable General Hux.  Humming as he approached an ensign. Knowing full well that the only way he could check was to waste time force probing General Hux’s mind.  A waste because General Hux was stubborn enough to fall unconscious each time Kylo Ren had tried, rather than break.      

“Is that the shuttle?”

This time the question was poised to the waiting petty-officer rather than General Hux. The poor lad’s eyes nearly bulging at being both spoken to by his Supreme Leader, standing straighter to give the affirmative that Kylo Ren was correct.  The glowing speck on the ships sonar reading was the shuttle. 

“Very good officer.”

To both General Hux and the boy’s credit, he did not react.  Simply swallowing and holding his attenuative position, waiting for Kylo Ren to leave him.  The menace’s footsteps falling in a predator’s feign of nonchalance back towards a suspicious General Hux. 

“My gift came from Deveron, did she not?”

General Hux was ready for this; he had chosen the ordered list of supplies carefully for this.  Removing all traces of anything but irritation from his face he stepped closer to Kylo Ren.  The embarrassment easy enough to find, but the disappointment harder to summon as he spoke quietly.

“The coitus was unsuccessful; the medical officers feel that these supplies will help.”

General Hux was careful not to look around him.  Too ashamed to face his men; too frightened if he was honest to give anything away.  Kylo Ren raising a lone brow and scowling.  Almost eye level with the General, it was still easy to dwarf him with his added bulk.  Kylo Ren’s scorn completely readable as the threat he intended it to be. General Hux’s bulk was mostly clever tailoring and fabrics, he was faster, nimbler than the Supreme Leader; but not in this fight.  In this fight he had to win with brains not brawns.

“Trust me Ren, I want the desired out come as quickly; no quicker than you do.”

General Hux put all the scorn he held for this disgusting union behind the muttered snarl.  Meeting the Supreme Leader straight on with what he now allowed to be a challenge.  Kylo Ren seemingly finding that part of his story at least truthful and backing off to stand over the seated officers in the command section of the Bridge.  Each Officer giving the dark-jedi their uttermost undivided attention, whilst desperately trying to avoid eye contact.  No one wanted to be the one to be singled out when he spoke.   

“Bring the ion canons online, fire at that shuttle.”

Someone gasped; but no one looked around to claim it; and it was certainly not the quaking petty-officer who began inputting the firing sequence.  Kylo Ren for the first time in this conversation allowing something of pride to his stance.  Monstrous amusement alighting his eyes as he squared his chin back towards Hux; challenging him to cancel the order.

Hux was ready for this.  His stance needing no correction he looked out to the winking lights of the departing shuttle.  Moving to approach the viewport and placing his hands at his back in parade rest.

“You may fire at will officer.”

There was nothing on that shuttle that General Hux could not afford to go without; and that certainly was not where she was.  He did not think that Kylo Ren had bothered to check his quarters on the way to the Bridge; but he would not have found her in there either. General Hux was better than that. 

“The supplies Ren?”

He still needed to look as though there was a need for them.  Any deviation from the plan would not go well at this stage, he had allowed for Ren’s uncouth idea of efficiency and for his bullying pride.  He had set the bait, he just had to hook the line. 

“You and I shall head planet-side to collect them; bring the list General.”

Still in a pretence of annoyance General Hux picked up the holo-pad.  Huffing as the two men exited the Bridge side by side.  Both speeding up in a lazy pretence of trying to take the lead; one that neither men would relinquish to the other. 

They had almost made it to the waiting landing craft, when sirens sounded.  The claxons announcing the arrival of several unknown, but heavily armed ships entering orbit alongside the Finalizer. 

“Company.”

Gritting his teeth General Hux ran back for the turbo lift.  Summoning it quicker than Kylo Ren and demanding a coms report from the same officer Kylo Ren had requested a identify the shuttle.  Taking control of his ship and ordering weapons scans as he waited.  Ignoring Kylo Ren’s suggestion that they were outnumbered.  He knew they were outnumbered.  Just as he had known that Deveron was likely to side against the First Order. 

The lift seemed to be taking forever to arrive; still General Hux used the time to assess the Finalizer’s readings on the other ships.  Grimacing as the readings changed to show many smaller crafts exiting the larger one and heading straight for them.

“General may I suggest we take the landing craft and meet the Finalizer at a designated jump point after completing our supply run.”

Kylo Ren had no idea when to quit; the odds were firmly not in their favour.  Of course, the best course of action would be to head for light speed and get out of here.  But he was trapped in by the other ships; plus, he had a parcel to deliver first.  Giving the weapons officers permission to engage and deploying TIE fighters, the turbo lift finally arrived and in seconds deposited General Hux back to the bridge.  Kylo Ren choosing to head to the shuttle bay, most likely for his TIE. 

“Bombers Sir, they seem to be a modified version of the Star Fortress Sir.”

“Accompanied by what appear to be A-Wings Sir.”

Good Deveron had no intentions of staying natural; or bowing to the First Order.  This was good, for a while at least she would find sanctuary on her home-world.  If she had sense she would seek passage to the outer rim.  This show of force was larger than Hux had planned on; but given the ventral cannons it was hardly something he could not deal with.  It was still an ideal diversion.       

“See that they’re properly engaged; we cannot afford the same mistakes as before; give me Kylo Ren’s location.”

He needed him out of the way too and as expected Kylo Ren could be counted on not to run from a fight.  The foolish boy behaving as expected and speeding out to join the dog fighting, his course far from the Finalizer.  Perfect. 

“Two bombers down Sir, engaging the final four; Leader Ren’s unit is drawing off their escort ships.”

“Ventral cannons online and ready Sir.” 

“Seekers set to deploy at your command Sir.”

He listened to the order his training regime had taught these men.  His officers able to, given endless simulations and battle practices know exactly how to behave.  Each one relaying the readiness of their command station, deploy not at Kylo Ren’s Command; but his.  It would be too easy to also give the order to fire at the TIE silencer Ren commanded; but also foolish.  General Hux had seen the capabilities of the Force and listened to his father’s tails of Darth Vader’s abilities.  The son of Solo would possess both men’s conjoined skills; today was not the day to be rid of him.  He gave the orders to fire; but belayed the command to release the seekers.  The robotic missiles a much-updated version of the ones used on Starkiller, they could now recognise their TIE’s from the enemy’s; but nothing smaller. 

The dog fighting was going well, and perhaps it was time.  Walking to the waiting escape pods at the back he approached one; studying it apparently at random, before something akin to sentiment made him open it once more. 

Inside was the unconscious kitsune; drugged earlier by the medics she stirred a little, already showing hints of waking.  Her previous oblivion had been a necessary state needed to avoid warning Kylo Ren of her proximity; now the sooner she woke the better.  Reaching into a pocket, Hux removed the adrenaline vial and injected it into the vein marked on her neck. 

The effects were instant; as was her fear.  Still he had no time to fully explain away either, simply making sure that the safety harness was in place.  Gripping the side rail for support as the ship shuddered with what seemed to be some sort of impact.

Inside the pod, the kitsune was fully alert, and her plump, little mouth opened as though to say something.  Then quickly enough she seemed to have changed her mind, pursing her lips together in a way that drew his line of sight firmly towards her.  He wondered if the troopers and officers behind him could see fully into the escape pod; of he gave in and kissed her goodbye, of they would notice she wasn’t human.  Instead she just nodded, whilst to his frustration her eyes grew moist as he completed the safety checks.  She had to know what she was inside of; surely, she had the intelligence to work out the support systems.  Perhaps it was the tail end of the drugs that made her weepy, but as she sniffled Hix stepped closer, his mouth to her ear as gave the swiftest explanation to her current situation.             

“You are going home.  Don’t stop to take supplies, just run.”

It should have pleased her, not caused her to take one sighing breath and nod her head.  Ginger curls falling over her shoulders and spilling onto the tops of her breasts.  The red such a bright contrast to the green camouflage gear he had dressed her in.  Her arms grasping out towards him, eyes saddened and more-full of expressive failure than he had ever seen in anyone.  He allowed her to grasp him for a final, but hurried farewell.  Burying his nose into the crook of her neck and breathing deeply through all of his airways.  Banking her scent into memories he would unless deep into his cups have pretended to have all but forgotten.  Pulling from her before she could risk speaking and reaching for the controls.

Like everything aboard his ship, the escape pods would not work without First Order permissions to do so.  His DNA would be enough to do it, but he could not come with her; it was dangerous to leave his ship. He had refused to bond with her, so none of this should feel like it was killing him.  Setting the timer should not have left him shaky and reluctant to let her go, none of this should be this difficult.  Sentiment.  It was misplaced at the best of times and had he been less attentive to hers then he would have registered better the surrounding battle.  It seemed judging from the violent shake that took the ship that something had gone wrong.  Then with a flicker the electronics aboard his ship one-by-one began to flicker off. 

Which ever officer gave the command to restart the systems was redundant in his order.  The systems would have restarted themselves within seven clicks if they were at all able to do so; the ship was dead.  Whatever electro-bomb they had unleashed on them this time had stripped the ship of its main systems, the shields and emergency systems coming back online as programmed.  There was an hour at most of power in the reserve ion engines; enough time to do a full manual evacuation of all essential personnel.  Enough time to set the pod off and reach the other officers in the waiting command shuttle.

Offering the kitsune a rare grin, he stepped from the pod and gave the order.  Pressing his palm to the control panel to signal the evacuation countdown for all pods.  Timing hers to hopefully close before the others and barking out orders to the officers to head to their assigned pods, noticing as they did the handful of Stormtroopers aboard the Bridge sliding into join them.  It was not an unexpected action, there were few enough officers and the journey short enough to allow the additional bodies in the pods.  Still as one approached the one his back was faced to, General Hux turned and removed his blaster from its holster.  Snarling as he warned the man away and suggested he find another pod to occupy.  Then when he refused entering the pod to manually remove him.

It was too close quarters for General Hux to risk firing his blaster; so sliding a knife from his sleeve seemed a much more sensible option.  One which the offending stormtrooper seemed to have decided against, raising his blaster to fire. 

He missed the General, hitting the wall and singeing parts of the control panel.  General Hux momentarily distracted by checking the integrity of the escape pod didn’t notice until the frantic, yet angry screams sounded from the kitsune.  It had been a second at most, but long enough for the Stormtrooper to the little kitsune’s terror, think it was a good idea to begin removing her from her harness.

Now General Hux saw red.  His Knife finding easy enough purchase in the gap between the trooper’s armour plates.  Forming an easy enough hook for him to use to pull the weakly struggling man off of her, swiftly springing to refasten her safety harness.

He knew it was too late, but as the doors beeped to warn him they had closed and locked he was still too intently bothered on discovering her newly damaged harness.  Taking the three clicks he had left to secure her into the other passenger harness, retrieving the discarded gun from the floor and reattaching it to him.

“What about you?”

General Hux shook his head, then braced himself into a gap in the pod wall.  His basic training recalling for him the instructions on what do if his harness failed.  He was supposed to request the junior officer remove himself from his and make do with the damaged one; not secure an unwelcome guest to the only safe seat and disregard the danger to himself.  His stomach plummeting as the safety locks disengaged and the pod dropped.  The inertial force dropping him onto the belted kitsune, who seemed to have the presence of mind to wrap both her legs and arms around him. 

Blood trickled from the unconscious General Hux’s forehead onto your cheek, long before you realised he had been knocked unconscious.  His frame slight but still heavy to keep in place, you struggled to keep a hold of him as the pod sped on towards Deveron.  Searching for whatever had knocked him unconscious and coming up with blanks; your grip slipping, but determined.    

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anyone want to guess what's knocked him out?


	14. Chapter 14

Inertia kept the General in place far better than your grasping limbs could possibly have.  The landing had not been the smoothest, or the easiest; still you had ridden it out.  The escape pod landing with a series of thumps, then flipping over. General Hux slipping from your grasp and falling (much to your relief) into the padding of the seat opposite yours.  Your thoughts; muddled as they were seemed unwilling to pull into any sense of a cipherable reason for you being here. You could remember last being instructed to get into the cage in General Hux’s rooms, then falling asleep aboard his ship.  It made no sense at all as to the events of the last hour, why you had woken to find yourself strapped into what appeared to be an escape pod.  Or why it had landed here, where ever here was.  You hung above General Hux, the pod exit doors facing down and your harness the only thing holding you from falling atop of the unconscious man.

The door had not opened; probably a safety protocol in case you had landed on a planet with zero atmosphere.  Struggling from your harness, you twisted so that you landed painfully next to General Hux.  Careful not to damage the man any further, knowing he could be an essential ally in whatever world waited for you outside of that door.

There were dents in the pod and the lighting seemed to buzz with an occasional flicker that suggested it was not going to last much longer.  Still at least the display showed you had landed on a Class-M planet; though the display was blurred and unreadable as to the name of it.  Perhaps the stormtrooper had hit something important when he had fired off his blaster.   You needed to get outside to assess the situation; but you needed to know that whatever was outside, was less scary that the First Order.   

Underneath you General Hux lay slumped in the seat.  Still unconscious, there was a large raised purple mark to his temple; but his breathing thankfully regular enough not to worry you. Whilst somewhere in the carefully packed storage racks, you guessed there would be first aid equipment and other assorted survival equipment.  Stuff that General Hux had told you to forget about; just to run. 

You would have ran by now, if the pod exits not warned you that you needed First Order authorisation to release the airlocks.  That, or if the supply canisters that may have held escape-tools to break out, been available to you.  Instead you were forced to wait, panic rising the longer he was unconscious; none of this seemed to be right; it was all so clumsy.

“Why are you still here?”

The slurred question was put to you from a now semi-conscious General Hux.  His subsequent groan making you hurry all the more quickly back to his chair.  His eyes closed, but from the way he tried rearranging himself more comfortably in the chair.  Fussing over him as quickly as he could push your hands away from himself, his own fingers brushing gingerly over his fore head.

“You blacked out when we left the ship; where are we?”

Your presence seemed to make his eyes flicker open to look at you.  The left one you noted less open than the right; though equally as unfocused.  The swelling on his forehead at that side running down and around the eye.  The whites of it pink in places, making you wince for him as he ground his teeth together and looked you over again.

“I said for you to run, why are you still here?”

You shook your head, as much from the stupidity of his mistake in thinking you could leave a locked pod, as his stubborn insistence that you leave him whilst he was injured.  One of his arms reaching out to you and pulling your hair behind your shoulder and touching at your neck.  A hiss drawing your attention to the way his other arm hung weirdly to his side. 

“You’re hurt, let me.”

“No!”

It was the first time General Hux had ever yelled at you and the shock of it made you tighten up on yourself.  Flinching and ducking your head in an animal’s show of submission, just like a frightened little-fox.  The man who had shouted at you flinching and grabbing at his head.  That hurt him you guessed as he took time to recover, hoping that he would not be cross at you for making him hurt more.  Waiting eyes scrunched closed, listening to him breathing deeply and then felt him reach out for you again.  This time soothingly stroking your head and working under your chin, until you opened your eyes again.  Worried that his movements less smoothly co-ordinated than usual; how much was he not letting on about his injuries?

“I know I am hurt.  I have lost my ship and maybe more. At least do me the curtesy of running; let something go to plan.”

His words got quieter the longer he spoke, and his strained breaths more rapid.  A wheezing sound taking over as smoothed leather fingertips brushed the front column of your neck, falling in a linear streak down.  Your own hands shaking as they both reached up to touch at the skin were the collar had been.  The one the First Order had placed on you, like they would have a wild animal.  His meaning obvious despite the words his injured ribs would not let him speak.  You were free, once you could get the chip out, you would be untraceable.     

“I can’t get out; it won’t open for me.”

His head gave another shake at your nervous excitement.  Though this time he faintly smiled with it; an attempt to disarm any guilt you should have felt at leaving him.  Slowly working forwards until he had shifted himself to the edge of the seat.  Gasping and holding onto his ribs, reaching for the control panel. Frowning then hitting a button to bring forwards an access panel, entering a series of codes and then sighing as a series of clicks sounded; every door in the escape pod popping opening barring the access door. 

“The electronics are fried, you will need to use the manual release.” 

The release access-box was set next to the door.  Turning it instantly loosened the hydraulics on the door, sliding back to reveal a sliver of earthy ground and the smell of warm night air.  The scents of animals and plants amalgamated in it until they became something familiar to you.  But you couldn’t see outside the pod to check your destination.  Nor given his indifference aboard his ship towards you, could you imagine General Hux taking the time and effort to bring you home. 

Still you couldn’t quell the rising hope from creating butterflies in your stomach as you peered through the small gap. It was humidly damp, suggestive of a planetary based evening atmosphere somewhat very similar in scent to Devaron; it would be survivable.  It was going to be a squeeze to get out.  The gap created by the hydraulic of the opening doors just about big enough for you to crawl through; but General Hux had no chance.  Uninjured you were not sure if he was small enough to make it; and injured you were certain he could not fit. 

He gave a weak cough, and you looked back at him, guilt taking over and deciding for your feet; routing you to the spot.  Covered in lacerations and bruises, he was not a pretty sight.  Plus, judging from the way that he had to hold his breath to move, and winced at deep breaths.  He was even more injured than he looked. But not enough to keep silent from giving you one last order to leave, this time stiffly reaching to scoop something up from the floor and repeated himself.  Practically snarling until your feet finally listened to him.  

“Get as far from here as you can.  There will be a search party soon, do not waste this opportunity.”

It was the sense of contained anger behind the snarl that broke the spell.  Creating a sense of urgency that turned to a desperate need to escape the pod and his anger.  Clawing through the upturned top soil and topiary until your nails were thick with black mud.  The struggle through the subsequent bushes leaving the skin on your arms covered in scratches and stinging patches of raw nerves.  Scrambling forwards on shaky legs and looking around you desperately.  Trying to make out any clues which way was the best to go. 

You had been counselled to run, and your feet and nose chose the path for you.  Sprinting into further into the trees, climbing under and over felled greenery.  The underbrush thickening until you could at best manage a hurried walk.  Travelling well into what seemed to be left of the night and only stopping once your body demanded it of you.  Listening for the sounds of possible prey, hoping to scent water soon.

The longer you had travelled, the more positive you were that this was Deveron.  Everything about it was familiar; the smell, the foliage, the animal sounds and the occasional flitter of what you were sure were disturbed Taka-teys. 

That meant an area you knew how to survive in; possibly returning to your own kind.  Somewhere there would be huge, sprawling settlements and cities nestled in the underbrush and built into the trees; you just had to find one.  As a lone female, you would have nothing to fear from the Devaronian’s; their women ran the cities and from history you knew they would not hesitate to help a lone female traveller.  Better yet, if you ran into your own kind, as a young unclaimed omega; anyone would help you. 

So, alone in the dark of the forest, it was not fear for you that made it difficult to find a spot to sleep for an hour or two before the sun made the heat uncomfortable; but guilt at having left an injured man behind.  It should have been anger and worry mixed heavily with despair at having to leave your fox-skin behind.  That should have been your first worry; not the man who had kept you as a pet. 

You wondered where yours was, sniffing as you looked up to the sky.  Hoping that if it was aboard that ship, it was still intact.  Shivering despite the warmth at the thoughts of it gone; or worse given to another. 

You perhaps would not have minded General Hux borrowing your skin; though you could not imagine him doing so.  He seemed to loath that part of him; so much so that perhaps he had surgically altered himself to avoid doing so.  Dousing himself in cologne and wrapping his body in human clothes until he had forgotten who he was.  A pity, as a fox, it would have been easy enough for him to survive away from the civilization, that even you had got used to this last few weeks.  He would have been small and unnoticeable to the predators whilst he healed.  Injured he could have hunted the smaller animals and fur would have kept him safe from the elements.  As a mere human his chances were less positive. Even with the contents of his escape pod; without help arriving soon, his chances were slim.  Whilst far from incompetent; he didn’t know the terrain like you did.  You couldn’t leave him, no matter how sternly he had told you to go.

It was no good.  Your conscious could not let you leave him, and scrambling to your feet you began to retrace your steps.  Able to trace your scent where you could not your footsteps.  Your pace sadly not as hurried as your strumming heart wanted it to be.  Coming at last to the edges of the clearing his escape pod had made.  This time sniffing the air, cautiously making your way over to where the pod lay in the dirt and debris.  Listening out for the calls of other animals; thankful that none of them were discernibly close, or predatorial.   

The escape pod was much larger than you had realised, having neither taken the time or consideration to check it out in the night before you had fled. It lay nestled in the mess it’s decent had made of the jungle.  The trees surrounding it doing a good job of breaking the weak rays of sunlight up into concentrated beams of warmth that were less bright than they would have been above the leafy canopy.  The light glittering of the bare metal of the pod, catching in the small spaces that had not been soot-blackened by the atmospheric entry to the planet. 

It was not until you came closer, that you realised it had shifted a little; the angle was different to how you must have left it.  The door no longer as low as it had been.  Then there were blackened stumps of small trees and more rivet marks in the soil.  This could be good, or it could be bad; perhaps he had manged to move the pod.  Either way you needed to know that General Hux was okay; that you had not cruelly left him to die.  Crawling cautiously over to access panel, finding that even now the metal still not cooled fully to the touch; he could still be in there. 

“General Hux?”

The panel still stood open, though worryingly this time the interior was pitch black.  All the lights that had previously blinkered on and off laying dormant and no sounds of any mechanics working.  Worse still what scent you could find of General Hux was old and stale; faintly intermingled with other more humanoid ones you couldn’t place a face or name to.  You had approached slowly enough that not even the nearby wildlife had been disturbed at your passing.  Sniffing the air as you went for any clues as to what could have happened, finding only the smells growing heavier as you reached the pod, mixed more so with lingering ozone and engine fuel but no signs of life inside.  

Taking a chance, you pawed through the boxes of survival gear, pleased to find that anything of real value had gone.  There were a few survival kits and one small first aid box.  The contents of which contained a blade sharp enough for you to take the time to roll down your trouser legs and remove the identification chip Ren had fitted you with.  Tossing it aside with the sharps and smearing blood meaningfully down the wall, before placing a field dressing over it.  Packing the remainders into the bagged survival kit and pulling up your trousers. 

It was not ideal to wait here even if you did think he could come back; others could come.  People who you had no wish to meet.  That General Hux was not here right now, did not have to mean anything bad though, just that he had gone from the pod. If he came back here he would see the blood; or read the chip from where ever he was and realise you had come to check.  He would know you had not been selfless; and you could live with yourself for having tried.  Perhaps his own people had come for him, after all surely as General he was the first to be rescued.  So why was there a heavy, sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach; one that anxiously wanted you to keep looking for him, despite knowing he could have escaped the planet by now.  A little nagging feeling that something was not right with the situation; it just seemed something was missing that you had not taken into account.

Leaving the pod, you almost tripped up over a piece of debris.  Not really realising that it could be valuable until hearing a metal ping as it hit the wall.  Questing with your fingertips until they retrieved a long delicate looking; but certainly, practical dagger.  Taking the time to stop to strap it to your leg; grateful to whomever had not noticed it you stepped into the daylight outside.  The bright sunlight making your eyes take longer to blink your pupils back to a workable size.  Exiting the clearing with what you thought was the same caution you had entered it.  Aware that the ties that bound you to General Hux were gone; it was time to try and make a home for yourself.

As an expert to this terrain, it was an absence of noise as you retraced your previous steps through the jungle, that let you know that something was wrong.  There was enough bird song not to worry; but there seemed to be less of the smaller mammals and lizard calls.  It was enough to set the hackles of your neck to rise in warning.  Careful not to let whatever was following you know that you were aware of it.  Using what superior sense of smell and sound to try and gain some idea of what you were going to face.  Scouting trees and bushes for somewhere to either run and hide; or else to stand your ground and fight. 

Whatever it was, it was getting closer.  Though you could neither see it, nor work out what it was by scent.  Confused and alarmed as an amalgamation of merged smells seemed to be growing closer; suggestive of a more intelligent predator.  One who either hid his scent to hunt animals; or else knew what you were and how to best sneak up on you. 

You were growing more concerned when the scents sort of split into two.  Not that they were any different, or easier to separate into individual smells; more that you could pin point them to two different areas.  One behind you, and the other somewhere in front of you.  Leaving you just the option of left or right. A decision easily enough made as you realised that to your right you could faintly both smell a source of water; and hear the fast and heavy rush of what was either a river or a roaring water fall. 

There were no trees available to climb; and given the animals intelligence; you would have been trapped.  Instead it made more sense to pull out the knife and at least choose a stance that made it look as though you knew how to use it.  Choosing to stand with your back to the only available exit, should you have the opportunity to run; shouting a greeting rather than waiting for whatever it was chasing you to gain the upper hand.  If it thought you capable and unafraid it would choose and easier prey. There was no answer.  So refusing to let your voice waver; you yelled again.  This time too fixated to have noticed that danger had come from behind.  Screaming into the pant-wettingly unfamiliar hand that cupped your mouth. Struggling against its owner, as it pulled you with it and into a thicker bush.  Sadly too easily over powered, not to lose the knife and be dragged to lie under your attacker. 

“Shush.”

The order was not as easy to obey when atop of you there was what was definitely; for all there was no tell-tail smell, a male body.  His chest pressed to your back and hand still over your mouth.  Its intentions as far as you could tell not as threatening as you first thought, from the way it just wanted you to lay still.

After a while it seemed still not to want to move; and heart thudding you tilted your chin down to your shoulder.  Surprised both that your assailant did not want to hide himself from you; and that given the scarcity of the colouring, his hair was as ginger as you were.  Long hair partially covering all but one green eye peeking down at you, a thick beard tickling the back o your neck as he shifted position.  Silently moving up your back and closer to one ear.


	15. Chapter 15

For your part you lay as still as you could.  Refusing to even breath too loudly for fear that whomever or whatever the they were outside your shelter could find you.  Disliking the rude way that the male kitsune seemed to have assumed the role of protector and thrust himself on top of you.  Waiting for him to give you the go head that it was now safe to move away from him; to take his hands off you.

After a while he took more of his weight onto his forearms; a sign that he was going to start shifting himself from laying over you.  A chill running your spine as he took the warmth of his chest from the length of your spine; apologising for his behaviour to you.  

“I think they’ve gone, but it is always best to make sure, just in case.”

You had utilised the small space you had to shrug him away from him.  Still the space in the little hollow was too small for him to be anywhere else but on top of you.  He was still unpleasantly close by, his breath tickling the dampened roots of hair at the base of your skull.  The chill from it unpleasantly warm as it hit the sweat-chilled hair.  That sensation better though than the weight of him at your back. 

“Who are they?”

You were careful to keep your voice low and clear of the threat you felt from him. Tilting your head around, both to carry the sound best towards him and to try and catch a glimpse of him.  Whoever he was, he didn’t seem to be too great a threat as such; but you couldn’t be too careful.  Especially since you were quite sure that at this proximity, you should have been able to scent something, not just of the soaps that he washed in and the clothing he wore.  Reacently your experience of the intentions of male kitsunes had not gone so great; just because he wasn’t First Order didn’t mean he would be any safer.

 “You don’t know?!”

The genuine surprise meant that his voice carried a little higher in pitch.  Causing him to tense up against your back and hold his breath.  Crassly placing a hand in warning to your mouth as he listened out.  Obviously too scared that he had alerted any stragglers to his location; but not sensible enough to realise you would have remained silent anyhow.  Still, a moment passed before he sighed, not so much in relief for not being found; as for the oxygen he could now breath in.  Taking a moment before he twisted around a little to look at you, rolling onto his side to look you in the eyes, his face softening, rubbing your arm as though it might bring comfort to you. 

“They’re wearing the same symbol on their uniforms as you are; they came from the same escape pods; who are you running from.” 

He was trying to be reassuring; kind even.  But instead he brought more fear and confusion.  He had not just moved to check your facial reactions; he had moved to let you see him.  Allowing you to take in sea-green eyes and orange furred ears, almost the same colour you had. Whatever blocker he wore had hid scent from you; but laid out at your hip was certainly another Kitsune.  This one just as male as the one you had ran from.

“Look we can hide you.”

Your first instinct was to refuse his help.  To chance that he would have the sympathy General Hux had not and let you go.  But you were frightened; no petrified of what would happen if they caught you.  Their leader Kylo Ren had been cruel enough already on the one occasion you had managed to escape, you could not even bare to think of how much more this run would cost you.

“Are you sure they were tracking me?”

Your voice was a whisper of confusion, not through necessity; but fear.  Shivering as you curled up onto yourself and lay whimpering lowly in your throat in a vain attempt to sooth yourself.  Both animal and human sides of you needed to calm down, to push fear aside long enough to make a decision on what was the best recourse of action.  Did you go alone; or did you follow your own path.   

The male declined to give you an answer.  Not that you needed him to affirm the truths you already knew.  They were searching for either yourself or for the injured General Hux; and if they found you Kylo Ren would personally assume you responsible for his missing General.  It only took the pant wetting thought of what he would do if he found you, for your whimpering to turn into panicked tears.  You were alone; the one person who might have been able to call off the hunt was long gone, and in his wake that left only a promised of pain; and at best certain death should the First Order get to you.  You couldn’t quite believe it, but you now understood the value he had subtly placed in your safety.  Alive, General Hux would have been able to advise what to do.  How to escape, who to trust; what was practical as well as wise. 

But right now, you were left with a scentless male.  One who had at least seemed to have offered to protect you.  One who was now slowly curling himself up around your back, stroking at your hair as he took the typically protective position around your spine.  Laying still beside you, until you had stopped weeping long enough for your sense of self-preservation to give you a solution to the issue.

“We need to go.”

His solution to your suggestion, was to take charge; roughly bundling you up and out of the shelter.  Taking the care and time to check both for smells and sounds as he looked around the surrounding greenery. Assuring you it was safe to go before he pulled you fully from the shelter. 

“This would be quicker and a lot safer on four legs”

“I can’t.”

Despite the shame, he was still looking expectantly at you to now explain your refusal, the earnest gaze making you drop your face to the ground and mumble your further excuses and explanations.  Ashamed at having to explain that the men hunting you had already obtained your skin; that they had understood the importance of what it was and now you were trapped in one form.

His eyes flew wide at that, then across his features there was the definite show of sympathy as he had asked how they had known to identify it.  Your own face pulling into a confused frown, your head dipping to a shake with the realisation that you had never considered that.  The knowledge hitting your gut like a punch, Kylo Ren had known what you were before he had captured you; he had known to take your animal skin.

Realising your distress, the male next to you pulled you into what you guessed was supposed to be a comforting hug.  One that had you stiffening up at the invasion of what you considered your personal space, your own arms hanging loosely at your sides as you waited for the forced contact to be over.  Realising as he had pulled away and suggested gruffly that you both get moving; that there was finally the tiniest hint of musk flittering through from the gland near his neck.

“Where is your scent?”

Your question was blunt and suspicious; not at all the cunning gathering of information you had hoped to gently garner.  His shoulders and jaw tensing defensively, making you try to pour oil over the troubled waters with a garbled explanation.  Not wanting him to be too defensive; you knew your survival was best achieved with his help.

“I can smell it, just a little when your closer; but it’s practically gone.”

That seemed to relax him just a little; though something was odd about the way he shook his head.  Making you balk a little at the realisation that he had been entirely too quick to take your question as a threat.  Something that you tucked away to be of use later. Right now, you needed to accept this offer of comradeship, no matter how suspicious you were of it; it was still safer than the First Order. 

“We should continue.”

There was a tension to his carefully enunciated words, suggesting a difficulty in answering your question, that also signalled the start of the next leg of your journey.  His refusal to meet your gaze just yet, reminding you that you too where oddly lacking as a Kitsune right now.  Perhaps you thought as you followed in his footsteps, that like you; he too carried a shameful secret as to why he had no obvious scent. 

If walking through the dense scrub of the jungle had been difficult; then the thicker, sunless tree canopy was worse.  It was hard going; the male setting an almost brutal pace, that would have been much easier to match aboard the flatter planes of the spaceship you had reacently called home.  The sunlight barely filtered to this level, so it was dark; yet so hot and sticky that your clothing stuck to you.  Stumbling forwards through a tangle of roots and rotting greenery.  Flies and other stinging insects fluttering around you both; all of them very interested in trying to make an eager meal out of your flesh.  Even the air felt too hot to breathe properly; and when you forgot to use just your nose, each breath earnt you a mouthful of flying insects.  There had been an offer of a scarf to wrap your face; but the added heat made it unpleasant to lay against your face, so you had given it back.  Noticing as you had that the insects seemed less interested in your companion than yourself.

“Scent blocker; it blocks the hormones that attract them.”

His explanation made sense; and brought you some relief. Although surely there were plenty of other products that would have repelled the insects without masking what he was.  Still you supposed that there had to be a reason this was to them a better choice; one that he was clearly refusing to share with you.  One that suggested that there was more to it than the insects. Still, there would be time to ask this later.  For now, all that was essential was to get as far away from the First Order and Kylo Ren as you could.  The gruelling pace and biting insects demanded though that you concentrate on each foot-fall, rather than your worries.  Relieved when the undergrowth grew more alive and verdant, the canopy less closeted.  The jungle had ended not in a clearing as you were expecting, but in high, sheer, black wall, littered with scrawled, silver-veined rock wall. 

The male was determined to prove that he was very much still leading.  Pressing a finger to his lips in the universally accepted order to remain silent; the gesture clearly meant as an order for you to follow.    

You were not happy with his treatment of you, but if truth be told; you were too exhausted and thirsty to do little more than catch your breath.  Any concerns you might have made about this being the wrong way, soon ended.  Straightening yourself back up, when from some hidden crevice two more kitsunes stepped to join you.  Their hair a varying shade of russet, one scentless like the one at your elbow. But the other one full of the thick, cloyingly dangerous musky smell of male. 

If the scentless ones had unnerved you, then the way the scented male looked you over was worse.  Making you oddly nostalgic for the indifference of General Hux; and the gentleness of his civilised approach to you.  The alpha straightening almost to a macho posture.  Spine straight and shoulders back as his eyes began crawling over you; lingering longest on curves where sweat made the fabric clung closest to.  Narrowing when he met with your scowling brows, raising his chin to you in a show of definite, but miss-assumed superiority. 

“Omega, reacently finished a mated heat, judging from the stench.”

It was all there. Not just in his voice or the causal way he described the smell of the last few days activities; but the embarrassment of the other two males that blinked away their own shock at his derogative tones.  His scowl far more than the distrusting and defensive stares of the first male.  Your kind could easily scent the subtle differences between the two different completed heats; a mated or a bonded one. But to openly discuss what had happened with a stranger; was crass and beyond rude and scentless ones clearly knew this.  One’s face had blanched white and both their cheeks coloured, as a redness began blooming on them.  The floor suddenly, becoming overly interesting to them.  The Alpha male clearly more in charge here than they appeared to be.  Continuing to be rude, for all he too should have known that he was being rude in his bluntness.  It had to be deliberate.  Perhaps just because of what he thought of you for being female; or perhaps more because of something else.   

“Not the first of your kind we’ve found today”

There was something about his actions being deliberately rude, that was far worse than the uneducated, casual cruelty of General Hux.  His eyes lingered not on your neck, but the First Order insignia attached to your clothing.  Making you snarl and push back from his grip, teeth bared in a warning.  Not of a promise of threat, but a show of defensive fear that he would assume you had chosen to be with your captors.  Horrified that this might once more, lead to you being returned to Kylo Ren and imprisonment within the First Order’s custody.   

You wanted to challenge him for his assumptions; but lately there had been enough time spent with enough men bloated with their own self-superiority, to carry within you a warning.  One that your constantly edged sense of self-preservation made sure to heed.  Not because you were docile; but because as it had first with General Hux, it served a purpose now.  It made sense to let them under estimate you; even more so, when one male accidently played a card in your favour.

“She’s not with them,”

The reacently joining males seemed to have relaxed at that.  Their opinion of you clearly changing as their stances did.  Their facial features now a little more welcoming as your rescuing male explained your uniform. Gratefully processing quickly that they had given you the Alpha’s name; and suggested that he meant First Order. 

“She’s an escaped prisoner Cohen.”

It was strangely relieving from the way they discussed both you and whomever else they had seen, that it didn’t mention an unknown omega; the one you had lost.  Refusing to let the rising hope show that this meant that he could be still alive, that somewhere the General was okay and back on his way home.  Optimism making you over confident, that it meant you were now safe from them all; and that small part of your life was soon to be over.  That General Hux had successfully freed you from Kylo Ren.

There were looks and it seemed to be after a quick discussion, they had decided that you were going to go with them.  For now, you had decided to go with it; even if it meant having to go with the unknown kitsunes.  Their interest was thankfully now in you being a lone and possibly defenceless female and not some member of the First Order.  Perhaps from the way the two scentless males were staring closely at you, it meant at least someone would look after you.  Suggesting that wherever you were going to be taken, you would be treated as such.  Not as a wild animal, as the First Order had seemed to think; but as a humanoid.   

The third; Cohen, though was still concerning you with his behaviour.  Rudeness or perhaps over confidence encouraging him to step closer to you, than perhaps was polite.  His fingers long as slender as they reached out for you; but not you told yourself firmly, in any way poignantly reminding you of General Hux’s.  Cohen plucking at the fabric there, to pull a little too roughly at your shirt collar.  Which thankfully for you, held too tight for him to undo, as you stepped back.  Frowning as you told him to back off from touching you.  Guessing that he was attempting to check the bonding gland at your neck. Gruffly and perhaps reluctantly explaining his behaviour to you.

“We have no suppressants; if you are an unbonded female, then we need to know before you enter our community.”

You refused to answer his question. Mainly because growing up, you had always been told in your own small community that somethings were private. But also, because something of the alpha’s behaviour towards you, was more than a little unsettling.  Why was he so rude, and what sort of kitsune community was so archaic that they didn’t have suppressants?  You knew that with suppressants it would be entirely up to any female, to tell another of their status; let alone give details of your bonding and mating choices.  Perhaps you had been sheltered; but until now, you had never heard of suppressants not being an option amongst your own kind; and to be fair had you met them before your capture, this would not be an issue.  Another thing the First Order had taken from you, when they had refused you suppressants as well as your freedom.        

The alpha, Cohen seemed to have decided something from your reluctance.  The set of his jaw still suggesting that he was less than keen on you; but the other two more welcoming.  One indicating that you should follow, as Cohen began to lead you through what felt like miles and miles of dark tunnels.  Ones that even with your ability to see in lower light, you knew you would have struggled to navigate.  The sounds of water, and echo alone disorientating and confusing enough, without the twists and sudden turns.  Following blindly, until you stumbled as quickly as you had entered the caves; yet far less elegantly into blinding sunlight.

It took a moment for your sensitive eyes to adjust back to normal light; an arm pulling you suddenly to a stop.  But when you could see, you were not disappointed; it was beautiful.  Looking down from over the ledge someone has stopped you from almost falling over, onto a huge clearing.  Trees and a wall of mountain behind you, surrounding an open and vast village.  Fields and houses intersected by fast flowing, shallow rivers, each leading down to a massive body of water that ringed the open entrance.

The journey down the steep slope was slower, and this allowed you to see more of their village.  Surprised that despite having spent so long on Devaron, you had never seen anything like this.  Several bodies now becoming obvious as you climbed lower, each one topped with hair in a varying shade of red. Anything from so dark it was almost brown, to so pale they were almost white-blonde; each one unmistakably kitsune.  Arriving amongst them all many exchanged greetings, thought there was a real sense of curiosity at the stranger the three men had brought with them.  Many perhaps showing signs of uncertainty at you, most likely brought on by the clothing you wore.     

“We make for the large hut in the centre of the clearing.”

The male who gave you orders, was not as breathless, or as flushed with exertion as you were when you nodded an understanding of his order.  The heat of the remaining rays of sun through the sweltering planets atmosphere still warming you as you reached the village and dusk touched the land.  Your eyes though, were adjusted enough that they could still make out where you were heading.    


End file.
